Dome’s Damage Raises Questions : Baseball: Remainder of Mariners’ home stand is called off after tiles fall from ceiling of Kingdome. Series moved to Boston.

When four 15-pound acoustic tiles dropped 180 feet from the Kingdome ceiling into choice seats behind home plate, some Seattle Mariners wondered if the current stadium renovation would include a retractable roof.

No one was hurt in the mishap several hours before Tuesday night’s game against the Baltimore Orioles that marked the first time a sporting event at the Kingdome has been postponed.

The incident occurred before the stadium’s doors were opened for the fans, and players were warming up on the field away from the debris. The game was postponed.

What could have been a disaster

Tuesday was instead a warning to Kingdome officials that all was not safe in the 18-year-old structure where the Mariners and the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks play home games.

Kingdome officials Wednesday called off the rest of the Mariners’ home stand--a doubleheader against the Orioles on Wednesday and a four-game weekend series against the Red Sox that was rescheduled for Boston’s Fenway Park.

“Obviously, the schedule change does not help the team,” said Dave Aust, a Mariner spokesman. “But first and foremost is fan safety.”

A team of forensic engineers inspected the dome Wednesday to try to determine whether the problem was localized.

There was speculation that a $6-million project to strip and reseal the roof of the domed stadium, under way since the spring, led to the ceiling failure, possibly by allowing rainwater to seep through newly exposed cracks and soak the tiles underneath.

A report from the engineers will not be ready for several days, according to Kingdome spokeswoman Carol Keaton.

The next event scheduled for the stadium is a professional soccer game on July 30. The Mariners are due back Aug. 2, and the Seahawks have scheduled an exhibition game Aug. 13.

This was not the first time a faulty stadium has forced a home team to play on the road.

In 1991, the Montreal Expos played their final 13 home games on the road after a 55-ton concrete beam fell 20 feet from the outside of Olympic Stadium onto a walkway. As a result, the Expos played their last 26 games on the road.

Last season, the Syracuse men’s basketball team canceled one exhibition game and moved another after the Carrier Dome had to have its roof deflated because of pressure by snow and ice.

In 1978, the roof of the Hartford Civic Center collapsed about six hours after 5,000 fans watched the Connecticut men’s basketball team play a game. As a result, the New England Whalers of the World Hockey Assn. moved to Springfield, Mass., until Feb. 6, 1980.

In 1968, the roof of the Spectrum blew off during a storm, forcing the Philadelphia Flyers to play the final month of its NHL season on the road.

The Kingdome ceiling, spanning about seven acres, is made up of 80,000 wood fiber tiles, each one about three feet by four feet and held in place by metal frames. Keaton said several tiles near those that fell had been bolted to the ceiling this year. They appeared warped and stained and “we didn’t like the looks of them,” she said.

The Mariners’ 20-year lease with King County, which owns the Kingdome, runs through the end of the 1996 season, but team officials have been unhappy with the facility for some time.

“We want a stadium that will be competitive in the league,” Mariner spokesman Tim Hevly said. “The place leaks, it’s wet, now tiles are falling out. . . . This (incident) is more or less what we’ve been talking about.”

The irony of the Mariners being officially rained out of their indoor stadium was not lost on officials, especially as the weather forecast for Seattle throughout the week has been perfect for baseball--clear and hot.

As for the Kingdome, Keaton said, “it looks like it’s going to be a long, wet week.”