ENGINEERING INSIGHTS | At Marina Bay Sands, around 1.4 million litres of water sit almost 200 metres above ground, across three towers that do not move in exactly the same way. Supporting that weight is only part of the engineering challenge. The pool also has to accommodate movement. In its technical account of the project, Arup describes how differential movement between the towers had to be considered under gravity, wind and seismic loads. The SkyPark incorporates separate

An operating room does not just need to be clean. Its air needs to behave differently from the air in the rooms around it. Modern operating theatres are carefully controlled environments where ventilation, filtration, temperature, humidity and pressure all form part of the engineering strategy for reducing airborne contamination. One of the most interesting parts is something you cannot see: air pressure. For many operating rooms, the room is maintained at a higher pressure t

Last week, we promised skyscrapers, extreme winds and why stopping a building from moving is not actually the goal. So we thought we should start with the obvious one. Burj Khalifa stands 828 metres above Dubai, but the interesting engineering starts more than 50 metres below it. Before construction moved skyward, engineers tested foundation piles under loads of up to 6,000 tonnes. The completed foundation would eventually rely on 192 reinforced concrete piles beneath a massi

After spending the last few weeks freezing everyone to death with Antarctic engineering, we thought it was probably time to move on. We’re not quite ready. But we are heading north. Permafrost sits beneath around 24% of the exposed land in the Northern Hemisphere, and across Alaska, Canada and other Arctic regions, engineers face a problem that sounds almost backwards: sometimes, the ground beneath a building needs to stay frozen. Permafrost can contain large amounts of groun

At an Antarctic research station, fire is one of the most serious risks to life and infrastructure. Extreme isolation, dry conditions, limited water resources and critical infrastructure make fire protection a very different engineering challenge. Last week, we followed the water infrastructure at the Amundsen Scott South Pole Station and finished with a dedicated pressurised water tank supplying the station's automatic sprinkler system. That tank is part of a much bigger sto

Last week, we explored how the Amundsen Scott South Pole Station operates without public utilities. One question naturally followed... Where does the water come from? Most of us don't think twice about turning on a tap. At the South Pole, every litre of water has to be created. There are no rivers, lakes or underground aquifers. Instead, engineers melt compacted Antarctic snow deep below the surface to create an underground water reservoir known as a Rodwell. Rather than cont