Construction workers in Rio are busy building thirty-one 17-story towers for the 2016 Olympic Games, and the crews are employing a special strategy to deal with the tight schedule.
Photo courtesy of Karl Tuplin/BAS Responsive to moving ice, hydraulic legs on skis allow the modules for the British Antarctic Survey's latest Halley station to be raised and towed across the Brunt Ice Shelf. Related Links: Discovering Antarctica Website Halley Research Station Website Building the British Antarctic Survey's newly commissioned research station in one of the remotest, coldest spots on earth was every bit as tough as it sounds.A short, nine-week construction season, bitter weather and tortuous supply lines were always on the daily management agenda. An unwelcome surprise arrived when cracks appeared in the first module of the Halley
Photo by Bruce Damonte In plant, workers connected most two-sided assemblies using wrong bolts. Related Links: Reshaping of Barclays Center Made Possible by Collaboration, Digital Tools Arena Subcontractor's 'Untimely' Default Delays Enclosure Concern for public safety at Brooklyn's Barclays Center—after the discovery that mostly under-strength bolts were used in the facade's prefabricated facade assemblies—was allayed soon after the error's discovery last August, says the curtain wall inspector. Even so, this week, the arena's curtain-wall fabricator is finishing up a fix that replaced 1,768 of the 23,351 bolts."There is a tremendous amount of redundancy," says Israel Berger, CEO of the New
Courtesy of Synergy Thrislington A 200-member team broke the speed record in India by assembling the components of a steel-framed building in two days, working around the clock. Courtesy of Synergy Thrislington At the site, workers erected prefabricated floor subassemblies and other factory-built components. The builder claims that nearly 80% of the work was done in the factory. Related Links: Instacon Time-Lapse Construction Video Synergy Thrislington In just 48 hours, workers assembled the prefabricated structural-steel subassemblies and other components—without any interior finishes—of a 10-story building in the industrial town of Mohali in northwestern India. The still-unfinished building holds the nation’s
Related Links: Forest City Ratner Cos. Skanska USA After nearly a year of negotiations with the union locals and two months of prototyping in the factory, the developer of the $4.9-billion Atlantic Yards sports village in Brooklyn, N.Y., has given the green light for what is planned as the world's tallest modular building, the 322-ft B2 residential tower.The project is also the catalyst for the formation of a modular division within the Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York, which represents local unions. In a major departure from the norm, the trade council's new division will allow crews
Photo Courtesy of Turner Construction Co. All three shifts of Turner workers at Madison Square Garden paused for on-site talk. Related Links: Frank Gilbreth's Bricklaying Ergonomics Harvard Business Review: Lean Service Machine To drive home the importance of lean construction practices in project delivery as well as jobsite safety, Turner Construction Co. paused its 45,000-person staff and subcontractor workforce in North America for 30-minute to one-hour tutorials, delivered company-wide on Sept. 4 to all shifts. This year's "safety stand-down" is the eighth annual post-Labor Day event the contractor has held to push the message of job safety."This was a chance
Crystal Lagoons Corp. Lagoon-like structure on the Sinai Peninsula will use similar technology to one built by the same developer in Chile in 2006, but the Egyptian pool will be larger. Crystal Lagoons Corp. The pool, seen here in an early construction photo, will be the centerpiece of a luxury resort and residential development. What appears to be a dried-up pond in the middle of a vast construction site at the tip of the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt could set a new record as the world’s largest swimming pool. Details are sketchy, but Crystal Lagoon is set to be the
Shams Gate's prime contractor, Arabian Construction, and its steel fabricator-erector, Eversendai, developed a scheme that relied on first erecting sections of the 300 meter-long, two-story penthouse on low-level platforms and then hoisting the structures into place. The scheme was considered safet than erecting the elements piecemeal at an elevation of about 245 m.
A former chief inspector of New York City's buildings department may have incriminated himself twice while testifying in a criminal case against a crane executive—who was also his former boss. That was the view of lawyers for the victims of a fatal 2008 Manhattan crane collapse, for which James Lomma is on trial. He is accused of negligent homicide and other charges in the high-rise accident that killed operator Donald Leo and sewer worker Ramadan Kurtaj.Prosecutors believe the crane supplied by Lomma had a poorly repaired turntable. In his testimony, Michael Carbone, the former regulator and onetime employee of a