Dancing On a Kansas City Balcony

July 17th, 1981 three sisters decided to split a hotel room bill and enjoy the weekend. they stayed at the Hyatt Regency, a beautiful place. marigold ran downstairs to do some dancing in the courtyard daisy elected to stay in and read a novel she wanted to read. lily thought this was hilarious as she danced on the walkway “come on out here!” she yelled to daisy, who continued reading her book. hundreds of young dancers were in the courtyard now. lily could see her sister marigold from her dancing spot on the walkway. other people joined lily, dancing on the walkway they could see young people dancing on balcony two also. “that’s not safe!” daisy said, as she peeked out to see who was making all the noise. there were pops and cracks. “get in here!” daisy told lily. lily laughed. The fourth floor balcony slid down a few inches. “GET IN HERE NOW!” daisy yelled. BAM! There was an explosion. lily was gone. balcony four fell onto balcony two and then the dance floor. dust came into the room. daisy slammed the door. she was not rescued for hours, but she was rescued. whereas both lily and marigold were gone. under the rubble. the deadliest structural collapse in US history until the collapse of the world trade center twenty years later. dancing on these walkways killed one hundred and fourteen people and injured two hundred and sixteen others. the fire department’s jacks could not move the tons of steel and concrete. every company with cranes and heavy equipment came to help. it took fourteen hours to rescue the last survivor.