Moving house

August 29, 2005 9:12 PM

The winning design for the British Antarctic Survey's Halley VI station looks very futuristic. It's built on legs with skis (a runner up - walked) so that it can be moved around and avoid being buried like some 1, 2 in the past.
posted by tellurian (13 comments total)

Walking buildings is pretty cool. Why can't they move the whole building around with it's own power (instead of a bull-dozer) on skis. Is this still not the future yet?
posted by Balisong at 10:08 PM on August 29, 2005

Hmm, maybe an engine would make the whole thing too heavy?
posted by HiveMind at 10:21 PM on August 29, 2005

Why did they pick this spot again? Antartica has some very dry and stable sites.
posted by stbalbach at 10:32 PM on August 29, 2005

Oh great.. the Thing will be mobile now.
posted by rolypolyman at 10:42 PM on August 29, 2005

Insane photos of the previous stations. It's just sad that even Antartica is not free from mobile homes. Next year they'll be selling double wides there.
posted by riffola at 10:43 PM on August 29, 2005

it is cool, but will it be sturdy enough during storms?
posted by amberglow at 10:44 PM on August 29, 2005

Technicalities be damned—build those Hopkins Expedition snow walkers instead! As noted in Section 3.3 of Design Concepts for Halley VI (682 kb PDF file):

The concept design suggested by Hopkins/Expedition/atelier ten for Halley VI is for two walking buildings. This is a very innovative approach to relocating the structure and has never been tried in Antarctica before.

The main buildings will be constructed from transportable, purpose-designed container pods, with hydraulic legs that will allow them to step up and “walk” across the ice shelf on a regular basis. Ancillary facilities and cabooses would be located around the main buildings according to function... [more details and illustrations follow]

Even if their top speed was only 1/10th mph—ten times slower than the Space Shuttle's Crawler/Transporter—the HE walkers could cover about 15 miles per week. Throw in a couple of scout vehicles patterned after these Finnish tree harvesters, and sign me up.
posted by cenoxo at 11:19 PM on August 29, 2005

rolypolyman: nice. I wouldn't worry about the Thing; Kurt Russell will defeat it with his trusty sidekicks alcohol and fire.
posted by Derive the Hamiltonian of... at 1:09 AM on August 30, 2005

Stilts are the way to go -- the US has been building a new South Pole Station. Thirty years ago, the US built a dome there, but as with the British stations in the photos, it has become buried in snow and is expected to eventually collapse. But it doesn't need the skis -- it's safely in the center of the continent, after all, even if the ice sheet is slowly moving (while the actual South Pole does, you know, not).
posted by dhartung at 1:39 AM on August 30, 2005

Why did they pick this spot again? Antartica has some very dry and stable sites.

Originally Halley was built here because it lies right under the auroral oval, which makes it perfect for studying upper atmospheric physics. Logistically it is the only place nearby which has naturally forming snow ramps which can be used to resupply the base. Now there has been a base there for 50 years there is tremendous value in the long-term continuous data set, which moving to a new site would disrupt.

it is cool, but will it be sturdy enough during storms?

The current base, Halley V, is also built on stilts 5 metres above the snow surface. It tends to rock gently in storms but it's solid enough that it's not in any danger of blowing away.
posted by astro38 at 2:25 AM on August 30, 2005

I wonder how they handle the toilet problem these days?

The battle of the pit:

In 1975 Andy Allman famously volunteered to descend into the loo pit. The loo was a 40 foot hole dug by the marines with two cubicles over it, which some wag had designated by painting a flaming sword on the door of one and a bleeding rose on the other. The results of our collective labours froze quickly and accumulated in a vertical direction. The resulting turdicles (or stalagshites) had grown so high they risked entering the bum zone so someone had to go and cut them down!

Andy was lowered into the 40 foot pit and heroically sawed off both, saving the base from an evil fate. His clothes were ritually burned afterwards!

posted by pracowity at 3:08 AM on August 30, 2005

Howl's Moving Castle. Cool.
posted by OmieWise at 5:40 AM on August 30, 2005

AT-AT?
posted by Pollomacho at 6:09 AM on August 30, 2005