Doll-houses
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I`ve been seeing some pictures about the devastation left by hurricane Katrina. Quite overwhelming I must say. My heart goes out to the people that suffered and are still suffering over there. :rose: What caught my attention is that most of the houses that were completely destroyed (at least from the pictures I saw), looked quite fragile. I mean they seem to be build up out of a wooden sceleton with some panels for walls. Now I was raised in Belgium(Europe) and am living now in Greece(still Europe ;-) ), and I have never seen a home made so fragile. In Belgium most houses are made out of brick, and here in Greece houses are made mainly out of reinforced concrete. Now if you live in an area with such a high chance of Hurricanes passing by, why is it that so many people made such fragile buildings their home? :confused:
I guess it has to do with the Hurricanes. The more expensive a house is (and more solid built) the more money you loose, when a Hurricanes destroys your house. So build cheap and build it again (after a Hurricane) I've heard something similar about the Japanese style of building houses, because of the earthquakes they're suffering.
All the label says is that this stuff contains chemicals "... known to the State of California to cause cancer in rats and low-income test subjects."
Roger Wright
http://www.codeproject.com/lounge.asp?select=965687&exp=5&fr=1#xx965687xx -
I guess it has to do with the Hurricanes. The more expensive a house is (and more solid built) the more money you loose, when a Hurricanes destroys your house. So build cheap and build it again (after a Hurricane) I've heard something similar about the Japanese style of building houses, because of the earthquakes they're suffering.
All the label says is that this stuff contains chemicals "... known to the State of California to cause cancer in rats and low-income test subjects."
Roger Wright
http://www.codeproject.com/lounge.asp?select=965687&exp=5&fr=1#xx965687xx -
I`ve been seeing some pictures about the devastation left by hurricane Katrina. Quite overwhelming I must say. My heart goes out to the people that suffered and are still suffering over there. :rose: What caught my attention is that most of the houses that were completely destroyed (at least from the pictures I saw), looked quite fragile. I mean they seem to be build up out of a wooden sceleton with some panels for walls. Now I was raised in Belgium(Europe) and am living now in Greece(still Europe ;-) ), and I have never seen a home made so fragile. In Belgium most houses are made out of brick, and here in Greece houses are made mainly out of reinforced concrete. Now if you live in an area with such a high chance of Hurricanes passing by, why is it that so many people made such fragile buildings their home? :confused:
What caught my attention is how people who: 1. have known that the storm of the century was coming their way, 2. could see this huge thing coming at them STILL stay there and not evecuate?! Frankly, I don't feel sorry at all for those people who stayed behind because they thought they could ride out Katrina. bibamus, edamus, cras moriemur
[eat, drink, for tomorrow we die] Cool plugins for Google Desktop -
I`ve been seeing some pictures about the devastation left by hurricane Katrina. Quite overwhelming I must say. My heart goes out to the people that suffered and are still suffering over there. :rose: What caught my attention is that most of the houses that were completely destroyed (at least from the pictures I saw), looked quite fragile. I mean they seem to be build up out of a wooden sceleton with some panels for walls. Now I was raised in Belgium(Europe) and am living now in Greece(still Europe ;-) ), and I have never seen a home made so fragile. In Belgium most houses are made out of brick, and here in Greece houses are made mainly out of reinforced concrete. Now if you live in an area with such a high chance of Hurricanes passing by, why is it that so many people made such fragile buildings their home? :confused:
From what little I know about construction timber houses are safer for both hurricanes and earthquakes. For earthquakes they flex a lot before breaking. For hurricanes the both flex and are easier to equalize the pressure. Here some advice is actually to open your windows and fix doors back for a cyclone so the winds pass straight through. However you might have seen hurricane or cyclone footage where the rooves blow off. From what I have been told is that this happens because of a unequal pressure between the ceiling and roof. - I have seen small buildings in Europe etc, and I doubt they would ever get a building license here. If I was to build a concrete or brick style house here (NZ) to pass inspection it would probably be several times thicker (walls) than in Europe. Thus the increase in expense, and the preference normally chosen is timber framing. Regardz Colin J Davies The most LinkedIn CPian (that I know of anyhow) :-)
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Bernhard wrote: I've heard something similar about the Japanese style of building houses, because of the earthquakes they're suffering. But there is also a danger of more casualities when the houses are destroyed with people in the house redindian
I think the Japanese's big problem in the past wasn't the earthquakes, but the resulting fires afterwards. Regardz Colin J Davies The most LinkedIn CPian (that I know of anyhow) :-)
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I`ve been seeing some pictures about the devastation left by hurricane Katrina. Quite overwhelming I must say. My heart goes out to the people that suffered and are still suffering over there. :rose: What caught my attention is that most of the houses that were completely destroyed (at least from the pictures I saw), looked quite fragile. I mean they seem to be build up out of a wooden sceleton with some panels for walls. Now I was raised in Belgium(Europe) and am living now in Greece(still Europe ;-) ), and I have never seen a home made so fragile. In Belgium most houses are made out of brick, and here in Greece houses are made mainly out of reinforced concrete. Now if you live in an area with such a high chance of Hurricanes passing by, why is it that so many people made such fragile buildings their home? :confused:
I would suspect that the reason that most of the homes there were built of wood is simple economics. Many of the people living in the area are relatively poor and probably cannot afford homes built of brick or stone. I doubt there is any great amount of natural stone available that might have been available to build with in the area, when my wife and I have vacationed in Biloxi, it impressed me more as a sandy area with lots of scrub trees and palmettos. Not a scientific fact necessarily, just an observation. As for why people would live in such a place... again its economics. Access to the Mississippi River and the Gulf make the area important to the American economy, this article[^] discusses some of the reasons why the city was built there. As I watch the coverage, my heart goes out to the people who couldn't leave. I'm sure that there were many people who made a foolish choice to stay, but there is no denying that many of them payed the ultimate price for a poor decision. I don't think the entire scale of this has really been recognized yet. Imagine the fact that what we are seeing on the news is only 20% of the population of New Orleans, and only the people who stayed in Biloxi and some of these other cities. There must be literal hundreds of thousands of people scattered through neighbouring states homeless and unemployed. :sigh: Uptight Ex-Military Republican married to a Commie Lib - How weird is that?
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What caught my attention is how people who: 1. have known that the storm of the century was coming their way, 2. could see this huge thing coming at them STILL stay there and not evecuate?! Frankly, I don't feel sorry at all for those people who stayed behind because they thought they could ride out Katrina. bibamus, edamus, cras moriemur
[eat, drink, for tomorrow we die] Cool plugins for Google DesktopBrian Azzopardi wrote: I don't feel sorry at all for those people who stayed behind because they thought they could ride out Katrina. I read an article the other day that pointed out (quite angrily) that a lot of people stayed because they were poor. Either because they didn't have a car or couldn't otherwise afford to leave. The author was quite pissed because he saw these people as being abandonded and left to take care of themselves.
The two most common elements in the universe are Hydrogen and stupidity. - Harlan Ellison Awasu 2.1.2 [^]: A free RSS reader with support for Code Project.
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I`ve been seeing some pictures about the devastation left by hurricane Katrina. Quite overwhelming I must say. My heart goes out to the people that suffered and are still suffering over there. :rose: What caught my attention is that most of the houses that were completely destroyed (at least from the pictures I saw), looked quite fragile. I mean they seem to be build up out of a wooden sceleton with some panels for walls. Now I was raised in Belgium(Europe) and am living now in Greece(still Europe ;-) ), and I have never seen a home made so fragile. In Belgium most houses are made out of brick, and here in Greece houses are made mainly out of reinforced concrete. Now if you live in an area with such a high chance of Hurricanes passing by, why is it that so many people made such fragile buildings their home? :confused:
That's the way most houses are built in North America. Wood is plentiful here and I suspect every area on earth builds out of what is most plentiful in their area. What is plentiful is what is most affordable and that's why you would be hard pressed to find a residential building made out of anything other than wood frame. They certainly don't seem fragile at any time, here in Canada they go through some pretty extreme weather in a lot of places and in hurricane country they go through a lot of hurricanes without damage other than the roofs and windows. Even a stone house in the direct path of that hurricane and storm surge water would probably be if not toppled by the water a shell with no windows, no roof and no interior. But like anything else, no matter what you build it out of it can be built well or it can be built badly. In our price conscious society a lot of things get built badly unfortunately.
"A preoccupation with the next world pretty clearly signals an inability to cope credibly with this one."
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What upset me were the scenes of abandoned, hungry people that the TV crews managed to get to but no one else did. And this after some twat yesterday bleating on about how nobody is helping. How about helping yourselves, pal? Why is anyone starving and without basic needs in the worlds most powerful country? It just makes no sense. And while I'm in a baaaad (sorry: no sleep) mood what sort of absolute moron builds a city SIX FEET below sea level in an area famous for the seasonal severity of it's weather? Beggars belief.
Mark Merrens wrote: what sort of absolute moron builds a city SIX FEET below sea level in an area famous for the seasonal severity of it's weather? ask the Dutch. Cleek | Image Toolkits | Thumbnail maker
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What caught my attention is how people who: 1. have known that the storm of the century was coming their way, 2. could see this huge thing coming at them STILL stay there and not evecuate?! Frankly, I don't feel sorry at all for those people who stayed behind because they thought they could ride out Katrina. bibamus, edamus, cras moriemur
[eat, drink, for tomorrow we die] Cool plugins for Google DesktopI couldn't agree more. In fact they had people on CNN who claimed that: 1. They didn't have time to get food. 2. They didn't have time to get water. 3. One claimed he didn't have time to put on his shoes...... Also, I can totally dismiss looting for basic needs like food, water, warm clothes, and survival gear, but these people are stealing 12 pair of Nike shoes at a time. :confused:
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I`ve been seeing some pictures about the devastation left by hurricane Katrina. Quite overwhelming I must say. My heart goes out to the people that suffered and are still suffering over there. :rose: What caught my attention is that most of the houses that were completely destroyed (at least from the pictures I saw), looked quite fragile. I mean they seem to be build up out of a wooden sceleton with some panels for walls. Now I was raised in Belgium(Europe) and am living now in Greece(still Europe ;-) ), and I have never seen a home made so fragile. In Belgium most houses are made out of brick, and here in Greece houses are made mainly out of reinforced concrete. Now if you live in an area with such a high chance of Hurricanes passing by, why is it that so many people made such fragile buildings their home? :confused:
As has been mentioned, wood is by far the cheapest buildling material in that region. Southern yellow pine, which grows like weeds in that area, is a very good material to build with. The other thing is that the soil in that area is very low, damp and swampy so the houses are generally built well off the ground to avoid water damage. To do that you need a fairly light weight frame which pretty much dictates wood construction. Again, remember that, until very recently, that area has always been very sparsely populated so that the desctruction from a single hurricane would have been very minor in the past. "Capitalism is the source of all true freedom."