"Today on "impossible engineering"..." "The Halley VI research station, the most advanced polar-built research facility on the planet..." "We have this fabulous station that enables us to operate in a year-round way." "...Located in the world's harshest continent..." "Antarctica." "We are actually just coming to a bit of a sticky spot." "It took revolutionary engineering and help from the innovative pioneers of the past..." "What a machine!" "It is amazing!" "Whoo!" "...to make the impossible possible. captions paid for by discovery communications" "Antarctica..." "Planet earth's final frontier." "Surrounded by the Southern ocean, covering five million square miles, its mass of ice makes up more than half of the planet's fresh water." "For 60 years, the British antarctic survey has carried out groundbreaking scientific research in this hostile environment." "And it's a workplace that engineer Chris Martin must brace for every day." "At the end of the day, you are here on your own." "It could be minus 50 and blowing about 50 knots as well." "Station leader Jessica Walkup must prepare the team for the most extreme winter storms on the planet, and the floating ice shelf beneath them constantly threatens their efforts." "You could have breakages of the ice shelf, meaning that you could be marooned on an iceberg." "Since the original Halley station was built in 1956, all five bases have succumbed to these remorseless conditions." "After a few seasons, the weight of snow and ice on top of them actually crush them and made them unusable." "To withstand the planet's harshest environment, engineers develop Halley VI." "It may look like the space stations of science fiction, but this is, in fact, the world's most cutting-edge ice station." "Located in Antarctica on the brunt ice shelf, this 16,000-square-foot modular structure is made up of eight prefabricated units." "Two bedroom pods sleep up to 52 people, the social module contains a kitchen, dining room, and a fully equipped gym." "To protect its occupants, expandable hydraulic legs neutralize snow drifts while 13-foot-long skis allow the 110-ton structures to be towed across the ice, making it Antarctica's first relocatable research facility." "But before its designers can even contemplate construction, they must face a seemingly impossible problem." "The biggest challenge, I think, on the brunt ice shelf is the isolation." "You have to be able to ship down every nut and bolt down to the very last thing that will be needed." "To bring in those vital supplies, captain John Harper must navigate through 3,000 nautical miles of ice fields." "Antarctica is a difficult place to get to." "Conventional ships would get damaged very easily in the ice." "They're not designed to hit anything apart from water, so it would very easily become damaged and would not last for very long." "So, how do you complete a journey across a seemingly impenetrable sea?" "This would have been impossible without one of history's most brilliant innovators." "Throughout time, ice has often been about having fun." "Ta-da!" "Yay!" "5,000 years ago, Scandinavians strapped animal bones to their feet to skate around their frozen lakes." "During the early 1900s, ice was used to race by any means..." "Hey, watch it, ya bum!" "...while saw-driven ice harvesters help develop luxurious tastes." "No, I wanted strawberry." "But despite its appeal, getting a ship through the ice was a major problem..." "Honey, I'm home!" "What?" "...and engineers had to think outside the box." "Oh, darling." "Dr. Rhys Morgan is riding the river Elbe in Hamburg, Germany." "Further north than continental America," "Hamburg's fresh water often freezes over in winter." "In 1871, the harbor froze over... not just for days, not even for weeks, but for months." "Shipping came to a complete standstill, and businesses were soon facing bankruptcy." "The residents of Hamburg were so worried that they came out in gangs with pick-axes and shovels to try and break through the ice, but it made no difference." "Local engineer Carl Ferdinand Steinhaus began looking for a solution." "Focusing on the ships themselves, he recognized their shape was the problem." "Imagine this sharp, pointed edge of my sledgehammer is the bow of my boat." "It's perfect for cutting through the water and the waves." "But let's see what happens when it encounters the ice." "It didn't cleave its way through the ice." "But Steinhaus realized that approaching the ice from a different angle produced a much better result." "Wow!" "That was amazing." "And coming from above makes a big difference." "So Steinhaus set out to create a spoon-shaped hull that could crash down on the ice." "The wider, shallow bow allowed a ship to slide up the edge of the ice before gravity forced it down on top." "The ship's weight produced a huge sheering force and reduced the ice's resistance." "To test it, engineers tow a scaled model with Steinhaus' spoon-shaped bow at around 3 1/2 miles per hour, simulating an ice breaker's speed." "The model's filled with instrumentation so they can see exactly what's happening, how the hull design is breaking up the ice." "With the ratio, the ice it's cutting through is approximately 3 feet thick." "In 1871, Steinhaus launched icebreaker I into the seas." "Its spoon-shaped bow design paved the way for vessels to reach the planet's most inaccessible locations." "To get to Halley VI in Antarctica, captain John Harper and his crew sail a Steinhaus-inspired engineering colossus... the Ernest Shackleton." "This 260-foot marvel tackles thousands of miles of frozen water in the treacherous Weddell sea." "We are actually just coming to a bit of a sticky spot." "I was gonna head down there to those pools, but it's gonna be a bit crashing and banging." "The rounded bow of this 440-ton ship undulates over the ice." "But to avoid any ripping, its polar-grade steel hull is streamlined without stabilizer fins." "A reinforced steel band known as the ice belt runs down its length to avoid crushing from built-up ice." "But these are extreme conditions." "The bit that we are about to go through is probably 2- to 3-feet thick." "Power is also key." "To keep the ice at bay, 2 diesel engines produce 7,200 shaft horsepower." "So, the secret is, is to actually just keep the ship moving, and that's why you're continually looking for the right way to go." "But as its challenging voyage draws to a close, thrusters allow the Shackleton to do something extraordinary." "Maneuvering the shaped bow, it carves an edge in the ice creating a usable pontoon ready to unload." "However, reaching Antarctica is just the beginning." "To create the region's most technically advanced research station, the Halley VI team must draw on the inspirational pioneers of the past..." "Whoa-ho." "These fibers..." "they're so cool." "...To create more impossible engineering." "Halley VI... the most advanced research station ever built in the polar regions." "Engineered by Aecom, scientists and support staff operate this modular structure, which incorporates a meteorological observatory, four laboratories, and an air-traffic-control facility." "But constructing this ambitious project poses significant problems." "Not only must every piece of equipment be imported," "Halley VI's designers must build it during the short summer window before Antarctica's brutal conditions return." "The seasons here are very short." "We're looking at 12 weeks maximum, really, between when you can start getting equipment and people onto site to start building." "And with eight modules to complete, including a 5,100-square-foot central pod," "British antarctic survey engineer Chris Martin must help take on something daunting... navigating materials from the ships to Halley VI." "The largest piece of infrastructure had to be transportable." "Our existing sleds had to be able to carry everything." "So how do you build such a technically advanced stricture at lightning speed in the world's most inhospitable environment?" "Achieving this would have been impossible without another great innovator from the past." "When it comes to building, humanity has often been in a hurry." "Me finished." "Nomadic Mongolians erected their yurts in an instant using concertina and wood." "They were so speedy to put together..." "Hello?" "Can I borrow some sugar?" "...even Genghis Khan was a fan." "Invading England, William the conqueror relied on building lots of castles very quickly." "Legend has it he even brought them readymade on his ships." "Steady, steady!" "But only during the 20th century did humanity master building at truly break-neck speed." "Oh, Harold." "Dr. Rhys Morgan is exploring Letchworth, north of London." "It's the unlikely home of a technique that revolutionized domestic construction." "It might look like a sleepy English town with its well-kept gardens and neat and trimmed hedges, but actually, this place was a radical experiment." "In 1905, a competition was launched to build a house in the countryside for just $185 in order to help low-paid agricultural workers." "One of the major costs of building houses is time." "Traditionally in Britain, houses are built using bricks on a layer-by-layer basis." "But the costs associated with this time meant that prices of houses in the country were way beyond the reach of the average farm worker." "To solve this housing crisis meant building at an unprecedented pace." "This house is revolutionary." "Not just that its looks... the main part of this house just took 36 hours to build." "This design was the brainchild of English engineer John Brodie who did away with traditional masonry techniques to build at lightning speed." "The secret of Brodie's success was his inspired use of steel-reinforced concrete." "He used pre-manufactured panels, which were both inexpensive to fabricate and quick to install." "Here in one of the bedrooms... this ceiling, the roof in actual fact, is a single slab of solid concrete brought down on to the walls at an angle." "As we look at the top, we can just make out the tie-rods." "These were the bolts that pulled the walls together and made the whole structure sound." "It's just brilliant." "To build Halley VI, engineers are drawing on Brodie's revolutionary prefabrication methods." "Shipping the entire station to Antarctica involves huge quantities of components." "But as British antarctic survey's engineer Chris Martin reveals, this first stage of construction starts" "10,000 miles away." "The trial erection's carried out in South Africa to make sure everything went together, 'cause it's quite important to make sure that we have a viable concept before we arrive here." "470 crane lifts unload around 10,000 cubic tons of material before they're organized and transported on giant sleds." "Once delivered, they form an astonishing 2 1/2-mile-long line of parts." "With just a three-month weather window, the construction team must build and fast." "Structural adviser Ben Rowe is working to support the station's heart... the 1,800-square-foot lab." "The steelwork that you see around you is a space frame, which is like the chassis in a car." "It provides the strength for the support of the floors and the structure above." "But importantly, it connects the four legs in this particular module together." "As temporary supports are removed, it takes less than one hour to raise each frame up on its 13-foot-long legs, then specific interiors can be installed." "As you can see, there's the prefabricated bedrooms, plant room, and W.C." "The next stage for this is the structural steelwork erected around it." "Cranes lift each superstructure into place." "Take it down, mark." "Take him down to about 10 1/2, see how it sits, okay?" "Once lowered, a typical pod is ready for its critical outer skin." "But with brutal winter snowstorms and temperatures as low as minus 58 degrees, engineers must use a material that's both lightweight and which can withstand Antarctica's brutal climate." "To do this, Halley VI's engineers must turn to a breakthrough invention from the past." "You can see that as the glass comes through those holes, it makes these incredibly fine fibers." "It's beautiful." "To make the impossible possible." "In Antarctica, Halley VI is the most technically advanced research station ever built in the polar regions." "But to create a lightweight material capable of withstanding" "Antarctica's hostile environment, engineers must turn to a breakthrough innovation of the past." "Physicist Andrew Steele is at Sheffield university in England." "At the glass laboratory, he's tracking down one of history's great breakthrough materials." "Some of the most important and fundamental discoveries have been made completely by accident." "But from penicillin to Teflon, they've nonetheless gone on to revolutionize the way that we live our lives." "In 1932, there was just such a discovery." "In Illinois, under the guidance of engineer Russell Games Slayter, researcher Dale Kleist had been applying molten glass through a spray gun testing its suitability as an adhesive when he stumbled on to something extraordinary." "So, this metal sheet represents the nozzles in Kleist's gun." "That's the molten glass, and we're gonna catch the results in this bucket of cold water." "Whoa!" "You can see that as the glass comes through those holes, it makes these incredibly fine fibers." "It's beautiful." "Once cooled in the cold water, the glass takes an unusual form." "And here we go... you can see we've made some primitive glass fibers." "This process was the first step on the road to the material that we know these days as fiberglass." "Further developed into fine, single fibers, this revolutionary material has a surprising quality." "You wouldn't think these things would be strong at all, and yet even with this relatively small bundle of them, they're strong enough that..." "Even if tried quite hard, there's no chance of me breaking it." "Now, that then evolved into something that looked a little bit more like this." "It's kind of a material woven out of those glass fibers." "And by the '40s, Games Slayter and Dale Kleist stiffened this weave with resin, creating what's known today as fiberglass." "But just how strong is fiberglass?" "So, this is our test rig." "These two huge jaws are gonna pull at that fiberglass you got stuck in the middle there, and they can apply up to 30 tons of force." "Let's start the test." "And you can see on here the graph of the force increasing as we go through the experiment." "This is very tense." "Ohh!" "And there we go... you can see a pretty clear line of failure there, and if we look on the graph here, we can read off... wow!" "That failed at 52,000 Newtons, which is 5.2 tons." "That's like five family cars." "That piece of fiberglass was strong enough to hold that much weight." "This chance discovery made for a robust alternative to wood and sheet metal." "Tough, moldable, and super lightweight, fiberglass can stand up to the most demanding conditions." "To tackle the world's most inhospitable climate, engineers are taking fiberglass to a whole new level... to envelope Antarctica's Halley VI." "These panels are made of special low-temperature composites with a foam-filled liner." "The massively proof against the environment that we live in here." "Cryogenically tested to minus 40 degrees, the outer skin is just 8 inches thick." "Not only is the glass-reinforced plastic super strong, it's also extremely lightweight..." "The glass-reinforced plastic keeps the construction very lightweight and therefore minimizes the load onto the legs, which is obviously important on ice as your foundations." "...Even with the largest panel measuring 375 square feet." "The last panel... on it goes." "Button up." "Hopefully it'll line up, but, uh, probably not." "Engineers cover all eight modules in just one week." "That's good." "We're there." "Creating a life-sustaining environment in Antarctica is a huge achievement." "But for Halley VI to remain standing in these icy conditions, engineers seek inspiration from history's revolutionary innovators..." "Aah!" "...To produce more impossible engineering." "Engineers have developed one of the world's most pioneering modular structures." "Halley VI defies Antarctica's brutal climate, allowing scientists to carry out crucial research and still survive in total isolation." "We have this fabulous station that enables us to operate in a year-round way." "The station can support life throughout an incredibly harsh winter." "But it's also providing a home." "An entirely self-sufficient structure, two energy modules contain water and sewage treatment plants, a medical facility includes areas for operations and dentistry, and there are plenty of creature comforts for this home away from home." "Most places of work are not also where you're living, socializing, eating." "It's got to not only be a functional, but also a really comfortable building." "It's a very well-insulated station." "It has very good control systems in it, which allow us to track temperatures, make sure that we're not overheating or underheating, and we can observe the whole station from a computer terminal inside." "Halley VI's structure sustains life in temperatures below minus 58 degrees." "But if this engineering phenomenon is to reach its 20-year life span, it must deal with another force of nature." "So, we get so much snow falling every year here." "Anything that's left here just gets buried very rapidly." "Halley VI's five predecessors have been engulfed by these relentless conditions, becoming part of the ice shelf itself." "So how can engineers rise above this seemingly impossible problem?" "Engineers must turn to another of history's genius innovations." "At a cemetery in London, scientist Suzie Sheehy is seeking out the burial grounds of a vital discovery." "15 feet below me is a unique piece of engineering history, but it's in a setting that's not for the faint hearted." "This place is amazing!" "Directly beneath the site of a former chapel lies a network of subterranean passageways." "The 180-year-old west Norwood catacombs were once the final resting place for wealthy and aristocratic families." "During the Victorian period, mourning the dead was a serious business, and instead of burying your loved ones in the ground, the preferred option, if you could afford it, was to bring them here." "There are about 3,000 coffins here lining the walls, but getting each of these coffins into their paid-for and allocated space was no easy task." "To contain the potentially deadly bacteria produced by the deceased, the coffins had to be made completely air tight by a heavy inner layer." "When it's lined with lead, it can weigh over 200 kilograms." "And getting something that heavy around 15 feet underground required a pretty clever piece of engineering." "In 1795, English inventor Joseph Bramah took the engineering world by storm patenting the hydraulic press." "But turning his revolutionary invention on its head offered the perfect solution for lowering and raising" "Norwood catacombs coffins to the chapel above." "This is a catafalque lift." "So the coffin would sit on here, and then it would take about 45 seconds to be brought all the way down, and this catafalque needed to be lifted all the way back up again." "And that's where Bramah's hydraulic press principle comes in and all centers on this clever pump system here." "So, in operation this handle would have been lifted all the way up and a hydraulic fluid would have rushed in to the cylinder." "And then when the handle gets lowered back down again, the pressure would be forced through there to another larger piston, which then lifts the catafalque." "In this water-filled system, the large strokes exerted on the small piston transfer to the large piston underneath the coffin, producing small but powerful movements." "Inching upward, it took 180 strokes for a 440-pound casket to reach the chapel above." "So, I can demonstrate the principle of a hydraulic press using this, which is like the one we had inside but upside down." "So all I have to do is exert a small force over this side over a large distance, and that's transferred by our constant pressure to this ram, which is gonna exert a large force over a small distance," "and the force should be sufficient to break this brick." "Aah!" "Wow, that was surprisingly easy." "Took me just a couple of strokes of this to exert so much force that the bricks literally shattered." "Bramah's hydraulic press was so successful that the same principle is used in almost every modern hydraulic system." "It was a brilliant piece of engineering." "Aah!" "Faced with extreme drifting snow," "British antarctic survey engineer Chris Martin can draw on Bramah's hydraulic innovation to keep the 1,100-ton Halley VI above ground." "We have this fabulous station, which is supported on the 34 computer-controlled hydraulic legs." "Each telescopic leg is made up of two 18-inch cylinders cleverly controlled from within the space frame." "We have this blue hydraulic ram, and that allows the two cylinders to move apart and, in doing so, allows the building's legs to be raised." "Every year when the winter storms roll in, the eight modules go through a metamorphosis." "Extending leg one." "We simply start at one end of the platform, and we lift up each leg individually, and we pack snow underneath it." "Each lift raises the leg 5 feet to the superstructure's collar." "Once the entire 650-foot-long station reaches this back-filled level," "Halley VI can then be lifted once more, continually stepping over the rising winter snow." "We can actually check inclination, we can spot movement, and we can advise the guys on the ground if anything needs to be done to accommodate movement in the snow." "This creative solution has conquered one of Antarctica's harshest meteorological challenges." "But another huge hurdle remains, and Halley VI's engineers must call on another of history's great innovators..." "This is incredible!" "What a machine!" "...to produce more impossible engineering." "Halley VI, Antarctica... situated thousands of miles from civilization, this research station can withstand earth's most extreme conditions, allowing the British antarctic survey to carry out vital research." "We've been collecting data in this area for over 60 years, so we need to be able to house the scientists in safety and comfort." "However, Halley VI must face another devastating force of nature." "Its location, the brunt ice shelf, is constantly moving and completely unpredictable." "The stresses in the ice shelf have opened up a crevasse that we call chasm I." "This chasm I has started to grow in the direction of our Halley VI research station." "If we leave the station where it is at the moment, then it might mean that Halley VI will be on an iceberg." "To avoid floating off into the Southern ocean," "Halley VI must be able to relocate." "But how do you move an 1,100-ton, 650-foot-long giant?" "Achieving this would have been impossible without the engineering breakthroughs of the past." "Mechanical engineer Daniel Dickrell is in Florida to unleash a truly mind-blowing feat of engineering." "Reaching an astonishing 55 miles per hour, the hellcat's top speed and maneuverability earned it a legendary status on the battlefield." "It's driven by a 16-liter gasoline-powered radial engine putting out 450 horsepower." "Now, the secret to the hellcat's success is not that horsepower itself... it's how that horsepower gets from the engine to those tracks." "This is possible through the hellcat's innovative transmission." "Up to the late 1930s, armored vehicles like the Sherman used standard manual transmission similar to your everyday car to transfer the engine's power to its tracks." "Manual transmissions rely on moving mechanical power from the engine to the transmission through a series of interlocking metal gears." "You get that wrong, and you have a horrible grinding noise that we all can recognize." "But in 1939, a team at general motors, including young engineer Oliver Kelley, developed a more efficient solution for the automobile." "Unlike manual transmission, the hydramatic transferred an engine's power automatically through a fluid via two fan-like components in a sealed unit." "And it works like this..." "We have two fans." "One we're gonna call the impeller, one we're gonna call the turbine." "The impeller's connected to the engine side, so what that means is we have always have our impeller side moving." "The second fan represents the turbine, which drives a vehicle's wheels." "It has no direct power source and takes its energy directly from the impeller's flow." "It's not moving, all right?" "So, let's say I want to pull away." "I take my foot off the brake." "We notice the turbine slowly begins to turn." "During world war ii," "Kelley applied his expertise to armored vehicles, but soon realized a transmission power delay could prevent the hellcat from getting a fast start." "The slow start was gonna be a problem." "When you're trying to move a large tank on a battlefield, it could be potentially fatal." "So Kelley's team complemented their auto transmission with another piece of engineering to create what's called a torque converter." "Inside the hellcat, toothed staters are positioned in the middle of the fluid coupling, redirecting the oil flow from the impeller, increasing torque and allowing the turbine driving the wheels to get to speed almost instantaneously, creating an explosive standing start." "You can see just what a difference it makes when we run the hellcat against one of the most successful vehicles of world war ii, the Jeep." "Daniel is re-creating an actual challenge carried out during the 1940s, one that is almost impossible to believe... a race between a 20-ton hellcat and the nimble, lightweight 4x4." "First up in this battle of transmissions, the manually operated Jeep is timed from a standing start at a 300-foot distance." "Go!" "Okay, 17 seconds..." "not too bad." "But remember, he's got mechanical gear chains, a manual transmission... lots of things that could have gone wrong." "The hellcat is 18 times heavier than the Jeep." "Hellcat, are you ready?" "We are ready, over." "But it's equipped with Kelley's groundbreaking auto technology." "Go!" "Wow, that was incredible... 15.9!" "Whoo-hoo-hoo!" "The hellcat actually is faster from a standing start." "Building a torque converter for a 20-ton tank is one thing, but adapting it to move an 1,100-ton ice base through planet earth's harshest environment is another." "The guys are probably wondering what they've let themselves in for." "To avoid chasm I, the engineers for Halley vl must adapt this groundbreaking technology to make the impossible possible." "The Halley VI research station... situated in the harsh wilds of Antarctica, this groundbreaking base is the world's first relocatable research facility." "But as the chasm I crevasse creeps dangerously towards Halley VI, structural adviser Ben Rowe and his team must use torque converters developed in the 1930s to shift their structure, which is around six times the weight of the hellcat." "We are relocating Halley VI 23 kilometers further up the ice shelf." "It means that we're moving over 1,000 tons of building here." "It's quite a big engineering task." "The concept is that the station is modular, so it breaks down into eight different modules individually towed." "To break this central module, dubbed" ""big red," from the ice..." "We're not ready in here." "...requires a staggering 66 tons of start-up force." "Three, two, one, engage." "A fleet of bulldozers and tractors equipped with torque converters generating 1,000 horsepower take on this mammoth task." "This substantial pulling power is only possible because of another clever piece of engineering." "The skis are made from steelwork, about four meters by one meter wide, and the bottom of each ski has a plastic-like sheeting, which actually helps with the slip resistance." "The combination of brute force and cutting-edge solutions complete Halley VI's seemingly impossible move in just 75 days." "This inconceivable structural masterpiece was created in four years." "Completed in 2012, genius-level design and engineering continued to keep the world's most inhospitable conditions at bay." "On a day like this, the guys who've just come down to face the next winter's challenges will be wondering what they've let themselves in for." "However, we have these very clever modules to Halley VI." "By learning from the pioneers of the past..." "Oh!" "...Adapting and making innovations of their own, engineers have set a new milestone." "They have succeeded in making the impossible possible." "I think the Halley that we have now is incredibly impressive," "And if you are lucky enough to spend a winter here, and you get to see the silhouettes... the modules against the Southern lights... that's a really special experience."