Designing Blast Containment Structures
The following factors should be taken into account while designing a safe building that can contain and minimize bomb hazards.
The following factors should be taken into account while designing a safe building that can contain and minimize bomb hazards.
- Space Design
The main building and any unsecured areas must be separated from each other to minimize damage. For example, the parking lot should be outside the main building area so that catastrophic damage is minimized. Functional and structural layout of the building need to be reworked to make it blast containing. Internal buffer zones, adding hard lines to the design, and including secondary staircases and elevator shafts in the main design of the building will ensure that the main and secondary portions of the building remain fully functional yet separate from each other.
- The configuration of the building
also plays a vital role in blast containment design. Convex shapes of
buildings should be preferred over concave shapes as air blast pressure
is minimized because shock waves travel at higher angles of incidence
than in a rectangular building. Horizontal orientation of the building
will reduce its profile and exposure. To avoid vehicle ramming or
suicide vehicle bombing, ensure that ground floor elevation is at least 4
feet above the grade. Providing pitched roofs, avoiding exposed
structural elements, and using earth sheltered design are some of the
aspects of safe building design to avoid blast injuries.
- Using
Green roof technology ensures that the visual profile of your building
is reduced. It also reduces the heat signature of your building. Use of
vegetation across the building, especially on its front, helps a great
deal to keep a check on hostile surveillance activities.
- Safe
havens must be designed within the building, and these should be
accessible to the occupants of the buildings in less time than the
attackers. This indirectly means that safe havens should not be placed
near the entrance or possible infiltration zones like ventilation ducts
and sewer pipes (in case of multistory buildings).
- Stairwells
should be practically far away from the main building area. In
emergency situations like a terrorist attack, people use stairwells and
not the lifts. If bombing has already occurred, only separated
stairwells from the main building will enable people to escape.
- The
non-structural elements like lighting, false ceilings, and duct work
should be minimized. If you are designing an office, keep it as simple
as possible because in blast bombing scenarios, these aesthetically
fascinating objects act as flying debris.
- To avoid chemical, biological, or radiological (CBR)
threats, advanced HVAC and filtration technologies should be adopted
because chemical warfare agents have far more dangerous consequences
than physical injuries. Filter placement, sealing of open spaces in the
ventilation chambers, monitoring and checking entry point of CBR agents
are some of the other important aspects of avoiding CBR threats.
- To avoid progressive collapses, cladding, exterior window systems, and redundant mechanical and electrical systems must be used.
