#extreme engineering

[johnychen]

IAAPA 2021 Extreme Engineering Press Conference Parkour Around and Suspe...

[sheltiechicago]

Mile-long ship tunnel will offer safe passage through hazardous peninsula

Slated to begin construction next year, the tunnel will cut through an entire peninsula, allowing ships to bypass Norway's most hazardous shipping route.

newatlas.com - By Adam Williams

[ojitoscolorcafe]

Yesterday we watch an extreme engineering installment on the Hong Kong airport in my intro to arch class and I’m still thinking about it today. And I’m gonna talk about it because it’s amazing!!! So I’m sorry this is a LONG POST.

Like, ok, Hong Kong’s original airport was crammed in the middle of the city and it was becoming a really big issue because as the city expanded up it was harder to fly the planes in. Planes would be flying in all day and night and barely be missing the tops of building and creating awful noise pollution. And as a major export city it was hard to export their products out because of the size of their location.

So they were like well guys wtf do we do??! We have no space here *freaks out* Where are we possibly going to build a freaking mammoth airport that could help us with all these travelers and exports?!??????? And a group of engineers were like HOLD UP and then shit got crazy. 22 miles off of downtown were these two mountainy islands and they were like BINGO. But you would think well uhhh how do you build an airport on mountains?! So they were like the mountains have to go! So they just fucking blew up the mountains and with some big ass machines went In and flattened the land and reused the rock and shit from the mountains to connect the land of both island building one huge ass island. wtf!!

Ok, now they had to figure out how to connect the airport that was in east Jesus nowhere to the city. And they did so with many connections. One was an underwater highway that connects back to land, another was one of the world’s longest suspension bridges ever built (and I don’t even want to get Into that because that in itself is another crazy thing), finally they built a few more miles of highway in which they has to expand the coast line along the rocky terrain to connect to the island. W T F. With all of this they had also come up with their super high speed train system which could transport passengers from a station in downtown all the way Into the terminal in about 20 minutes. (Yeah, they had to build that train station btw, it didn’t pre-exist).

On top of that they built, of course (!!), the most important part of this project, the airport terminal, which is one of the biggest indoor spaces EVER built. Which is also another story.

I think the most seriously whacked out fact about all of this is that they had to plan to complete this in less than 7 years…ALL OF THIS.

Before the project started Hong Kong belonged to Britian when they gained control in the Opium War. This gave them control for 100 years and then they would give it back. This was a problem because they started building the airport in the early 1990 and that meant they had seven years to finish the project before Hong Kong went back Into possession of the Chinese and they knew that the Chinese could potentially pull the plug on the whole thing. And they very close to made it. They had to ask for an extension on time because when the seven years were up they still hadn’t finished the terminal! The Chinese, seeing the great, positive economic impact it would have gave them one more year to complete it and they did!!!

THESE PEOPLE CRAMED 2 DECADES WORTH OF WORK INTO 7 YEARS HOW ARE WE AS HUMANS EVEN POSSIBLE OF DOING THAT. BAM you got yourself a brand new airport that will help you stay a leading exports power and provide to the large scale number of passengers traveling in and out.

Isn’t that crazy and amazing and things that you could never think possible are like no big deal because we can literally do anything :-)

[littlepawz]

If I had nightmares about bridges, this one would be the scariest one of all. And no, I am not putting Tibetan Bridge (Claviere, Piedmont, Italy) on my bucket list.

[the-morgul-blade-buried-wit-blog]

I have to take a shower but extreme engineering is on, oh the complicated choices in my life

[my-minds-elixir]

Extreme engineering  The Tibetan Bridge in Claviere, Piedmont, Italy

[zeitgeistz]

Extreme Engineering - JFK - Jet Blue Terminal

[zeitgeistz]

Extreme Engineering - World's Biggest Arch Bridge