The glass used to sheath the outside of modern buildings is no where near 4" thick. All of the structural loads are carried by the building's steel frame. Each pane of glass has only to be strong enough to support it's own weight and the calculated wind loads plus a safety factor. Add to that the fact that most of the glass is ordinary annealed glass that shatters into large shards, not tempered or laminated (safety) glass. If you look of pictures of downtown New Orleans you will see that most of the glass was broken on the windward side of the buildings - either from the wind or from flying debris.

Watch out below!

JimJr

That has been my experience as well. I'm wondering if this was some bomb/bullet proof building like the CIA or Pentagon. I am aware of some installations using safety glass (at least on the observation deck) and particularly thick glass in some instances, but nothing like 4-6"

I remember one building (I think it was Saint Louis) where on the upper deck, the windows were installed at an angle, so one could lean over and look down. They were incredibly thick, shatterproof, and I was told that they could carry an extra 2000 pounds of weight should one of the observers accidentally fall past the VERY strongly built railing. Even that didn't look more than 2" thick, and the framework was pretty impressive as well.

IN that case, I remembered wrong. :P I seem to recall prefacing with IIRC, which I didn't. *shrugs*

Dang... I was kinda hoping you were talking about a specific building. I know they are doing some amazing things with glass these days like transparent solar power embedded within, as well as auto-darkening to keep the people inside from needing sunglasses, piping inbound light with fiber optics, etc. I wouldn't be at all surprised if someone was using glass that thick for protection. I know some government buildings are treated to prevent vibration from sound and to scatter laser and be not only bullet proof, but bomb proof, etc.

Too bad you didn't RC, I was looking forward to the info! <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

How about the Superdome?!

Uhm... in New York City?

It was based in part on a paper that outlined the proper usage of .50 caliber precision rifles among urban law enforcement. One of the arguements for the use had to with the ability to penetrate the heavy glass in question. It was by John Plaster, so feel free to look for it online. In a few days, I'll be able to check my printed copy of the paper, I have it in storage.

Reception centers are just that - reception - that's where you get put on the bus for transport to the shelter - where do you stash 100K people for a couple of weeks? ALL OVER the place - Schools, Malls, Madison Square Garden, etc etc etc - I think the location list is over 200 long

The subways will probably go down - they did in the unnamed storm - the generator plant that makes the 25Hz power for the signals flooded

Bridges will have to close 2-4 hrs before landfall due to wind - remember, all of NYC except for The Bronx is on islands - what joy

The GOOD news is post the storm - we should be able to transport rescue stuff in by barge

The people here

http://www.whatifweather.com/

seem to thing a major NYC hurricane is likely.

Remember I was talking about "interesting"

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/24/nyregion/24evacuation.html

the title:
City Storm Evacuation Plan Is Unworkable, Report Says

BTW He's probably right - at least as of last years plans - I have not seen this years - NYC seems to be falling back into the old pattern of "We are the Pros, we don't need outside or volunteer help"