In late 2013 Arup joined numerous other consultants and tradesman in donating their time to restore the Rocky Creek Igloo for use as a war relic and memorial. Located near Atherton in far north Queensland, the Igloo remains one of the few intact buildings on the Atherton Tablelands that was built specifically for services during World War II. It formed part of a hospital camp complex for servicemen in the Pacific Region during the war. At its peak, the hospital had a total of 3000 beds which included wards for dysentery, malaria, mental illness and the usual battle wounds.

Arup was approached by the building’s trustees, the Rotary Club of Atherton, through Gayle Plunkett Architect to analyse and justify the original curved timber trusses to current Australian loading and timber standards. This involved creating a structural model which accurately reflected the real geometry, timber properties and loads seen by the trusses. Particular challenges which were encountered during this analysis included:

• Assessing the internal stresses induced by bending the timber to form the curved profile
• Assessing real material properties of the 70 year old timber
• Devising connection and ‘total truss’ strengthening details.

With support from timber experts in Arup’s Advanced Technology and Research group in London, our local engineers were able to recommend various strengthening details which would enable truss members to comply with the required standards.