CASE STUDY
In Sync Enerpac ‘SyncHoist’ synchronous lifting technologies play a critical role in sliding roof construction for major stadiums With an ever-increasing number of major outdoor stadium owners and operators around the world looking to incorporate sliding roof solutions into their facilities to combat the issues associated with climate change, one of the major challenges being faced by project engineers is finding a reliable method of lifting the massive roof components into position – safely, efficiently and with an extraordinary level of precision. Increasingly severe weather changes including heatwaves and downpours are presenting challenges to designers and specifiers of sporting and mass entertainment stadia. These seasonal and climate change issues that may be faced in the future by these massive buildings was illustrated over the past year by the bushfires in Australia that had burnt through 10 million hectares by January, sending plumes of smoke across 44
Construction Engineering Australia • Apr/May 2020
the Tasman to New Zealand and then around the world. Similarly, forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan, meanwhile, sent toxic haze across South-East Asia, aggravating respiratory illnesses and forcing the closure of schools, airports and entertainment events. The unusual weather associated with such events – ranging from electrical storms, to exhausting record temperatures exceeding 45°C in many parts of Australia – pose an ongoing issue for such stadia, the largest of which can each accommodate 100,000 spectators and athletes. The top 20 such stadia in Australasia and the Asia-Pacific collectively accommodate more than a million people.
STADIUM ROOFS CREATE HEALTHIER SPORTING ENVIRONMENTS One solution to coping with climate change being considered and implemented globally by architects and engineers is the construction and/or retrofitting of opening stadium roofs that can respond rapidly to changing
ambient conditions - protect the health and comfort of occupants, while at the same time safeguarding the financial and operational viability of stadia that can cost hundreds of millions of dollars to build. But such projects can involve a daunting scale of the construction and special lifting needs, including the precision positioning of components forming unusually long steel beams used in the construction of sliding roofs that can weigh 10,000 tonnes and more. Not only do these beam components need to be placed safely and precisely from considerable heights, but the operation must also be completed in as stable and as rapid a way as possible to protect construction scheduling, workers and the structure itself against the vagaries of weather conditions arising during the task.
MAJOR STADIUM ROOFING SUCCESS STORY One solution to this delicate construction task was employed recently in a landmark stadium
