Boise Airport hangar collapse case yields settlements for victims’ families
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Kevin Fixler, Idaho Statesman
BOISE (Idaho Statesman) — The families of two construction workers killed when an unfinished private plane hangar collapsed at the Boise Airport nearly two years ago settled a wrongful death lawsuit against two Idaho companies involved in the project.
The terms of the agreements are confidential, attorneys for the families and the project’s general contractor separately told the Idaho Statesman. In a related action, Meridian-based Big D Builders and Boise firm Walker Structural Engineering were each dismissed last month from the federal case.
The financial settlements were reached through mediation, Enrique Serna, an attorney for the two families, told the Statesman. Attorney James Thomson, who represents Big D Builders, confirmed by email the confidential nature of the resolution accepted by his client.
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Serna declined to say whether the two firms acknowledged any fault for the fatal accident in January 2024, citing the secrecy clause of the agreements. “The clients approved it, and they are satisfied with the result,” he said in a phone interview.
The large-scale construction project on airport property in Boise buckled and toppled over while crews were still building a 43-foot tall, 39,000-square-foot engineered steel hangar for the Jackson Jet Center. Three men died at the scene after each sustained traumatic blunt-force trauma injuries in the incident, the Ada County Coroner’s Office reported in the days after their deaths.
The victims were the two construction workers — Nampa residents Mario Sontay Tzi, 32, and Mariano “Alex” Coc Och, 24 — and Craig Durrant, 59, of Boise, co-founder of Big D Builders. Another nine workers were injured in the incident.
Serna and Boise attorney Jane Gordon represented the heirs of the two workers.
OSHA violations on appeal
Following a six-month investigation, the U.S. Department of Labor, which oversees the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, found an “appalling disregard of safety standards” at the construction site leading up to the hangar’s collapse. The federal agency asserted that the fatal accident was preventable with stricter adherence to industry standards.
OSHA issued citations and fined Big D Builders nearly $200,000 for safety violations — three serious and one identified as “willful.” Inland Crane, a Boise-based crane service working on the project, also was cited for a serious violation, with a recommended fine of about $10,000.
Big D Builders and Inland Crane separately appealed OSHA’s safety violations. Inland Crane reached a formal settlement in April with OSHA, which resolved the violation case. The fine was dropped and citation removed from Inland Crane’s record.
“The employer agreed to take additional steps toward improving worker safety, and OSHA has withdrawn the initial citations and penalties,” Michael Petersen, Department of Labor regional spokesperson, said in a statement to the Statesman in April.
Big D Builders continues to contest its safety violations from the hangar project. An OSHA trial is scheduled for early May in Denver.
Thomson, Big D’s attorney in the federal lawsuit, does not represent the company in its OSHA appeal. But he told the Statesman that his client declined to comment on the pending dispute.
Meanwhile, the company resubmitted modified construction plans for the project to the city and began rebuilding the hangar earlier this year, according to prior Statesman reporting. Jackson Jet Center did not respond to requests from the Statesman, but a Boise Airport spokesperson said the hangar was finished by June.
The hangar hosted the dedication ceremony of a cart for fallen soldiers returned to Idaho that month. A “Girls in Aviation” event followed there in September.
RELATED | Safety record of contractor for Boise collapsed hangar surfaces as OSHA investigates
Federal civil lawsuit continues
The two families’ wrongful death lawsuit against additional defendants is ongoing in U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho.
The case initially included six total defendants. Serna, their attorney, determined that a suit against the city over prior allegations that it approved faulty building plans was not warranted, so it was not included among them, the Statesman previously reported.
Prior to Big D Builders and Walker Structural Engineering settling with the families and their removal from the case, two other companies also were dismissed. One had no “independent liability,” while the other was a “defunct entity … and its name got a bit misused,” Serna said.
The remaining lawsuit names Inland Crane and Steel Building Systems, a U.S. custom steel fabricator with a location in Emmett. Inland Crane has declined to offer a settlement, a spokesperson for the company said in a statement to the Statesman.
“When OSHA withdrew its citation, it confirmed Inland Crane’s position that the company and its employees followed all safety protocols and were not at fault in the tragic incident on Jan. 31, 2024,” Doug Self, the spokesperson, said by email. “Inland looks forward to standing by this position and defending its employees, equipment, and work record in court.”
The listed attorney representing Steel Building Systems in the case did not return a request for comment Tuesday. In a separate federal case, Steel Building Systems’ insurance provider sued to avoid covering its client’s potential liability in the hangar collapse lawsuit brought by the two workers’ families.
Serna said his clients intend to maintain their case and see it to resolution through the federal court system.
“We are pursuing claims against everybody still involved in the case, and they both are responsible for my clients’ (loved ones’) deaths,” he said. “We will leave it to the people of the state of Idaho to make that determination when they are empaneled and seated as to who was more at fault — Inland Crane or Steel Building Systems.”