one rincon hill’s south tower :: photo source

you’re looking at the top of the south tower of one rincon hill in san fransisco, a building that boasts 60 floors, a total height of 641ft and a spot at the top of a hill in one of the windiest and most earthquake prone parts of north america. bearing in mind the skyscraper sits alone on the hill, without any surrounding protection from other high-rises, it’s therefore surprising to discover that one face of the building is curved, top to bottom, and as a result “like the wing of an airplane, it has lift”.

obviously there’s a solution to what could have been a problem.

see the rounded section that sits on the building? it isn’t full of apartments. it’s an enormous storage tank that houses a tuned liquid mass damper, and it’s full of water - at maximum capacity, approximately 100′000 gallons of the stuff.

the tuned liquid mass damper :: photos’ source

you may remember taipei 101’s (less damp) mass damper from a few weeks back, an enormous steel ball that swings like a pendulum to counteract the building’s sway. well, one rincon hill’s water tank is a different technology designed to battle a similar problem. as the tower sways one way, the water in the tank naturally moves in the opposite direction, the force helping to dampen the building’s movement. hence the name.
incredible engineering aside, if i owned that building i’d be in that tank most evenings, polystyrene bodyboard in hand, armbands fully inflated, praying for high winds.

below is a news report about the building’s mass damper (plus another neat and groundbreaking feature), explained by the tower’s architect. i’ve awarded the guy extra ‘brilliant points’ as his little talk resulted in my brain picturing a skyscraper skiing down a mountain, a scenario i’ve never imagined before but will definitely imagine again.