Hurricane Helene hit Florida’s Massive Bend area as a Class 4 hurricane with 140 mph winds. To this point, 33 fatalities have been reported. And whereas there was widespread flooding, together with the closely populated cities of Tampa and St. Petersburg, Tampa Common Hospital, located proper alongside Tampa Bay, has managed to remain dry.
That is resulting from a 5- to 10-foot excessive barrier often known as an AquaFence, which is going viral on a number of platforms due to the way it appears to have protected the area’s solely Degree 1 trauma middle.
As #HurricaneHelene continues, the AquaFence at TGH stands agency. The water-impermeable barrier is designed to face up to storm surge as much as 15 ft. It has labored by means of a number of rain occasions to forestall storm waters from impacting hospital operations. #WeAreTGH #StormWatch pic.twitter.com/papsd6oPg2
— Tampa Common Hospital (@TGHCares) September 27, 2024
AquaFence was based in 1999 and has workplaces in Norway and New Jersey. In keeping with the firm’s web site, its methods are “defending greater than $30 billion value of actual property in the USA alone,” together with all the things from inns to gasoline stations to a Shake Shack.
The product is designed to be put in shortly and (pretty) simply. In 2023, AquaFence USA President Thomas Briedis advised native outlet, WTSP Tampa 10, that 100 ft of AquaFence may be put in in half-hour.
“They arrive folded collectively, sort of like a laptop computer,” he stated. “You’re taking them out of the crate, put them down they usually fold open.”
Briedis additionally stated that the corporate is engaged on a line of residential AquaFences, which might price round $20,000. The boundaries are designed to guard in a Class 5 hurricane.
“We’re very assured within the system. It was been completely examined,” Briedis advised the outlet.
