The BEST episodes of Megastructures season 2008
Every episode of Megastructures season 2008, ranked from best to worst by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The best episodes of Megastructures season 2008!
Take an eye-popping look at the greatest structures and machines ever created as we focus on some of the world's modern-day super-human miracles of construction.
#1 - North Branch Correctional Institution (Hi-Tech Prison)
Season 2008 - Episode 9 - Aired 6/15/2008
The North Branch Correctional Institution (NBCI) will house 2,000 violent criminals. Its security measures are much more than technological marvels they are the features that will protect the lives of prison guards and revolutionize rehabilitation programs for inmates.
#2 - Sinking an Aircraft Carrier
Season 2008 - Episode 7 - Aired 5/29/2008
A specialist demolition team attempt to create the largest artificial reef in the world by sinking the aircraft carrier USS Oriskany. As they battle through thick steel plating and hazardous waste, the workers are aided by marine architects, divers, engineering units and local authorities.
Watch Now:Amazon
#3 - Beijing Water Cube
Season 2008 - Episode 5 - Aired 5/21/2008
Just in time for the 2008 Beijing Olympics, workers are feverishly putting the finishing touches on the National Aquatics Centre – the Beijing Water Cube. A stroke of design genius, this Olympic Megastructure is a steel honeycomb-like frame enclosed entirely by a unique skin, modelled after soap bubbles. Using 90 kilometres worth of steel in 22,000 beams following no conventional straight lines, the Beijing Water Cube must be topped with 100,000 square metres of bubbles. Looking for a truly unique covering, the design team focuses on ETFE – a light-weight plastic invented to protect spaceships from cosmic radiation. Among ETFE’s unique properties, dot patterns on its surface can trap solar energy in the winter and reflect solar energy in the summer, keeping the building cool. The Beijing Water Cube is the largest ETFE construction in the world, and because of its honeycomb-like structure, 3,500 ETFE bubbles must be cut individually, and sized. Factor in that the dimensions have been created in Germany and must be translated into a Chinese database and the Beijing Water Cube becomes a bit of a logistical nightmare. Beijing’s Water Cube represents a true morphing of molecular science, architecture and structural engineering.
Watch Now:Amazon
#4 - Power Tower
Season 2008 - Episode 16 - Aired 1/3/2009
Witness the Bahrain World Trade Center. Two 50-story glass "sails" rise over 240 meters into the sky along the shores of the Persian (Arabian) Gulf. This unique architectural marvel is powered in part by a revolutionary new means for a building this size - wind. It's the world's first large-scale integration of wind turbines into a skyscraper. Three massive turbines will supply clean power to the buildings. In this hour, we explore the science behind the concept and discover how engineers and construction crews attempt to tackle this audacious project. In an oil-rich region of the world, the team transforms the vision to reality and looks to the future, committed to a renewable energy source of mega proportions.
#5 - Icelandic Super Dam
Season 2008 - Episode 10 - Aired 6/18/2008
This episode looks at the Karahnjukar Hydroelectric Project in Iceland - an audacious engineering feat that includes the building of Europe's highest dam, the drilling of 30-mile-long tunnels and the construction of a gigantic underground power plant.
#6 - Deep Earth Drillers
Season 2008 - Episode 14 - Aired 12/20/2008
Mega Green Tech is in search of geothermal power.
#8 - South Pole Station
Season 2008 - Episode 3 - Aired 1/9/2008
Welcome to the South Pole, one of the most isolated places on the planet. For decades, the South Pole has been a haven for astronomy, climatology, and other science fields. Now, nearly 50 years after the first research station was built, a team of mega-builders is daring to construct a 21st century science research facility: the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station.
#9 - World Trade Centre Bahrain
Season 2008 - Episode 22 - Aired 7/12/2014
There are no such similar Buildings in the world. The Bahrain World Trade Center (also called Bahrain WTC or BWTC) is a 240-metre-high (787 ft), 50-floor, twin tower complex located in Manama, Bahrain. The towers were built in 2008 by the multi-national architectural firm Atkins. It is the first skyscraper in the world to integrate wind turbines into its design. The wind turbines were developed, built and installed by Danish company Norwin A/S. The structure is constructed close to the King Faisal Highway, near popular landmarks such as the towers of Bahrain Financial Harbour (BFH), NBB and Abraj Al Lulu. It currently ranks as the second-tallest building in Bahrain, after the twin towers of the Bahrain Financial Harbour.
#10 - Bridge Breakdown
Season 2008 - Episode 6 - Aired 5/15/2008
Demolition of the (1927) Carquinez Bridge in the San Francisco Bay Area
#11 - Shanghai Super Tower
Season 2008 - Episode 4 - Aired 5/14/2008
The design and construction of the Shanghai World Financial Centre which, at 101 floors high, will be China's tallest structure.
#12 - Mega Breakdown: Italian Bridge
Season 2008 - Episode 13 - Aired 9/10/2008
A historic bridge is being taken down and recycled, but the demolition team faces challenges while doing it.
#13 - Dam Busters
Season 2008 - Episode 15 - Aired 12/30/2008
A team of experts mobilises to demolish, excavate and recycle a 25,000 ton dam built of concrete and steel. The pressure is on: they have just half the time needed to complete the job. Worse yet, their biggest challenge stands behind the old dam – one million cubic yards of boulders, gravel and sand that the river has stacked against it for nearly a century. To remove this blockade, the team gambles on a radical, dangerous plan that's never been tried before: turning the energy of a perfect storm against the debris. If they are not successful, a generation of endangered salmon returning to spawn may be wiped out.
#14 - The World's Biggest Cruiseliner
Season 2008 - Episode 8 - Aired 6/4/2008
Looks at the technological designs and construction of the huge cruiseliner "Freedom of the Seas".
#15 - Beijing Olympic Stadium (Building Green Beijing)
Season 2008 - Episode 11 - Aired 8/5/2008
2010 environmental improvement plan in Beijing, China
