Recently a large Crane fell in Tampa and caused a lot of damage. I heard people say it was “rated” for wind speeds that were less than the wind speeds of the recent hurricane. How can it be measured down to certain winds speed, as in, 100 MPH is safe, but 130 MPH is not safe?
In: Engineering
You can calculate aerodynamic drag at a given air speed for an object with a given surface area and shape(using a wind tunnel to verify your assumptions), and you can build your structure strong enough to withstand those forces. The higher up, the more forces, both because winds are faster and because there’s a longer lever arm acting against the base of the tower.
force is proportional to velocity squared, so a 30% increase in wind speed is more like a 70% increase in forces.
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