The Southern Star – Cracked

Down the road from where I live there is a poor imitation of the London Eye, that Melbourne likes to call the Southern Star.

It is about one third of the size of the London Eye, resembles a Ferris wheel in a carnival, and looks out over a working industrial dockland, filled with containers and lorries.

This wheel was completed this year and has taken about two years to build.

The wheel has only been open a few weeks when recently it was closed.

The recent hot weather that Victoria has experienced appears to have directly affected the wheel, causing cracks in the structure.

It does force me to call into question the engineering of this structure.

I was under the impression that with structural engineering, you calculated the maximum tolerances, then tripled it to make it even more safe.

What were the engineers thinking, that the Australian weather, which is renown for its brutality on roads, houses, and people, would not crack a structure that was clearly designed as a child’s toy? Where did they think the wheel was being built, in Iceland?

I can only hope that it is not tax payers money that is footing the bill for this incompetence.

~ by jeditopcat on 11 February, 2009.