Havana, Friday, November 9, 2012. Year 16/Number 310 The "anti-Sandy" houses of San Pedrito The hurricane was impotent against houses with light roofing that had been properly made. Eduardo Palomares Calderón A CubaNews translation. Edited by Walter Lippmann. One of the worse impacts of Hurricane Sandy in the city of Santiago de Cuba was on housing. Different types of structures succumbed to the fury of the winds, thousands of buildings were totally destroyed, lost their roofing or had other serious problems. according to enrique and roberto, cometal houses could be widespread in the country In the midst of the dramatic picture, at the entrance to the modest neighborhood of San Pedrito, our attention was caught by a number of houses with light roofing which stood unharmed next to other houses with solid concrete roofing. The calculations of the Cuban designers proved stronger than the winds. Twenty-two houses with modular building technology (Cometal) and the 16 conventional houses with polyurethane flooring support and galvanized zinc roofs remained almost intact surrounded by collapsed fragile houses, fallen power poles and uprooted trees. Among the residents in the two-story Cometal houses, pensioners Enrique Zúñiga Ochoa and Roberto Miró Castellón tell us that the bent ends of a few tiles at the corners, and a few plastic panels of the roof that were lost in the storm mean nothing considering the tremendous winds they withstood. for MAIDOLIS THE QUALITY OF THE CONVENTIONAL HOUSES DEFEATED SANDY “The winds came straight from the sea with great force, the modules moved and I thought the roof was going to fly away because it vibrated; but it did not give in, and that makes us who live here feel very safe,” says Zúñiga, who adds that with a few screws everything will be solved. “People were amazed,” says Miró, “they knocked at our doors and told us to leave, because these little “sardine cans” could not resist the wind; but now they keep praising them. Cuba needs houses like these.” Eight two-story conventional houses remain in line across the street, well-painted, with block walls, polyurethane floor supports, and galvanized zinc roofing, made in only four months by builders from the municipalities of San Luis, Songo-La Maya, Contramaestre and Tercer Frente. “The wind was very strong,” says Maidolis Delgado Grave de Peralta who works at the Poder Popular Provincial [Provincial Government], “the doors, windows and the whole house were shaking, and in the dark I looked at the ceiling, thinking it would fly away; but the screws held, they resisted all the time.” A JOB WELL DONE f For civil engineer María Teresa Rodés Dáger, chief specialist for structures of the Empresa de Proyecto-15 in Santiago de Cuba, the resistance shown by both types of technologies during the onslaught by Sandy, was due to a very demanding control of execution which resulted in the quality of the product. “In the first case,” she explains, “we are talking about the Cometal modules designed in Havana with modifications made by our company. They have pillars and sides of laminated steel which --like the supports between floors, the panels of polyurethane covered by aluminum plates and the light roofing-- need to be very well-secured. According to Ricardo Castillo, assembly line team leader of Cometal in the province, the experience they had in San Pedrito proved that each set of two houses with two or three bedrooms each, can be built in 55 days with the maximum of security guaranteed by the total compliance with the specifications of the designers. The other structure designed by Roberto Ferreiro Monier, community architect and project leader of the housing program of Empresa de Proyecto-15 for San Pedrito, has a simple cover without large projections and holding locks for doors and windows which properly connected to the structure guarantee their strength. Both experts agree on the fact that the two types of structures resisted winds stronger than those considered in the Cuban norms for Santiago de Cuba, and thus came out successfully of an extreme situation beyond the calculated test of wind resistance. After the hurricane, specialists from Cometal, ACINOX Las Tunas (that has principal responsibility for the construction of siding and panels) and Empresa de Proyecto-15 assessed in situ the behavior of the structures which, like the Venezuelan model of Petrocasas, were not harmed. Apart from validating these construction systems for the country, the main lesson after Sandy resides in the strict compliance with the requirements of the investment process and established quality norms. |
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Las casas “antisandy ” de San Pedrito
El huracán resultó
impotente ante viviendas de cubiertas ligeras ejecutadas adecuadamente |