Another first by Bangladesh in South and South-East Asia, a base-isolated building for the Fire Service and Civil Defense HQ
By Tanzim Anwar
Bangladesh is set to build the first-ever totally jolt-resistant multi-storied building with base-isolation for headquarter of Fire Service and Civil Defense in the capital, first of its kind in entire South and South East Asia.
“A base-isolated building is built away (isolated) from the ground, resting on flexible bearings known as base isolators, that will only move a little or not at all during an earthquake,” Additional Chief Engineer of Public Works Department (PWD) Engineer Syed Mahfuz Ahmad told BSS today.
The initiative was taken under a project titled “Urban Building Safety Project (UBSP). The PWD will implement the project with yen loan scheme of Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
Ahmed, who is also the project director said Japanese engineers will transfer technology to the local engineers in constructing the building at Mirpur at a cost of Taka 250 crore.
“We will use laminated rubber type bearing foundation for the building that will absorb the shake during any jolt,” he said adding that it will take five years to construct the building.
The present HQ of the fire service department at Lalbagh is vulnerable to earthquake. “Considering the vulnerability of the existing headquarter, We decided to construct a tremor resistance building for the headquarter with a rescue modern control room,” he said.
As part of the earthquake preparedness imitative, the government has a plan to re-strengthen major emergency response buildings. “if the fire stations and hospitals collapse then how would we conduct rescue operation after any tremor. That why we have decided to make the emergency response building earthquake resistance,” Ahmad said.
The planned fire service HQ building with 2,200 square meters for every floor, will be energy efficient. “it will be smart building like a smart phone and it will be grade-1 as per CASBEE (Comprehensive assessment system for building environment efficiency),” the Project Director said.
Deputy Programme Manager of JICA Anisuzzaman Chowdhury said Japan uses seismic isolation most widely in their civil buildings.
Since the Hanshin-Awaji earthquake of 17 January 1995 when the effectiveness of seismic isolation was demonstrated, base-isolated buildings have become more popular in Japan, he said.
He said currently JICA is assisting Bangladesh with numbers of disaster preparedness projects focusing building safety and community level awareness towards earthquake and other disasters aiming at building a disaster resilience government.
“It will be a dream building for FSCD. The building won’t collapse even during a high intensity earthquake. After constructing the building, we can claim that at least rescue operation will be coordinated properly after any tremor,” Md Ataul Haque, joint secretary of Home ministry and PD of FSCD said.
The building will be constructed at the existing FSCD Training Complex at Mirpur. The FSCD is going to move its training complex to Purbachal.
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