-
Jun 12, 2007 10:28 pm US/Eastern
-
Digg |
Facebook |
E-mail
|
Print
Designing Against Ferocious Hurricane Winds
dl
MIRAMAR (CBS4) ―
There is the fury of nature and then there is the science of how to tame its damage.
That is essentially the job of RWDI, the world's largest privately owned wind-engineering firm. The Canadian company hosted a grand opening last week in Miramar for its newest testing facility.
It's helping architects and engineers learn how to design buildings to withstand hurricane-force winds. And it does so with a wind tunnel that resembles a long hallway, eight-feet wide and 110 feet long, with two giant fans at one end and a rotating circular platform on the floor at the other end.
"The public wants to know they can be safe within a building," said one manager of RWDI.
Scaled-down models are subjected to various wind speeds from every direction in a wind tunnel experiment. Right now, it's churning gusts at 45 miles per hour, so powerful that words could hardly be heard.
"The advantage of a wind tunnel is you can get precise measurements so we can design for the demands the the hurricane is imposing," explained a local company official.
The technology was used in constructing the Carnival Center and the American Airlines Arena in downtown Miami.
The typical cost? Well, for a thirty-floor condo, it's $50,000, but some would say worth every penny for such peace of mind and tranquility in the midst of a storm.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)