Friday, April 8, 2016

Wrong House Razed: Google Maps Glitch?

The owners of a tornado-damaged duplex in Rowlett, Texas, arrived home on Tuesday to find something unexpected: Their home had been leveled by a construction crew.

“I pull up, and — sure enough — it’s gone,” says Lindsay Diaz, one of the home’s owners. “There’s nothing left. …  How do you make a mistake like this? I mean, this is just the worst.”

Some media reports are partially blaming Google Maps. The site confused the two addresses and pointed the company to the wrong duplex, according to reports. The company had a demolition permit to tear down another duplex that was one block away.

Billy L. Nabors Demolition CEO, George Gomez, told the media that his crew made a mistake but then added it’s “not a big deal.”

City officials quickly fired back. “I think this is a huge deal,” city manager Brian Funderburk says. “The home owners were in the process of trying to figure out what it was going to take to repair their home and now they’re looking at rebuilding instead. I think this is a very big deal.”

The home’s owners, Lindsay Diaz and Alan Cutter, have filed a police report.

The couple owns both sides of the duplex. After a Dec. 26 tornado tore through the area, the couple said they had been waiting on insurance and a possible Federal Emergency Management Agency to decide on repairs of their home.

Source: “Company Says Demo Mistake ‘Not a Big Deal,’” ABC-WFAA.com (March 24, 2016)

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