Mortenson's FCG Submarine Escape Training Project Wins Award

Minneapolis, MN - The Eastern Pennsylvania and Delaware Chapter of the American Concrete Institute (EPDACI) recently announced this year’s winners of its annual award program. FCG’s Submarine Escape Training Facility project was one of the more unique projects recognized, walking away with a 2008 Grand Prize Award in the Cast-in-Place Concrete Frame – Outside Chapter Boundaries category. The award honors excellence in concrete design and construction.

The Submarine Escape Training School was built on the New London Naval Submarine Base in Groton, Connecticut. the oldest such facility in the nation and home to 8,500 sailors and 17 nuclear submarines. In May 2005 the base was targeted for closure along with 33 other military installations nationwide, but less than four months later, New London won a reprieve from the Department of Defense’s Base Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC). The 587-acre base not only survived, but also resumed its ambitious capital construction program that includes the one-of-a-kind design and construction of this $13.2 million Submarine Escape Training Facility, which provides realistic training methods for the escape from sunken and disabled submarines. The 22,600 SF facility is designed to accommodate and support a 20-ft diameter by 40-ft deep escape tank pool system used for escape training.

The entire building was engineered to accommodate Navy requirements for progressive collapse resistance. If part of the building suffers trauma from an explosion, caused either by an external attack or a natural disaster, the design would keep the whole structure from falling. A cast-in-place concrete frame was selected to accommodate progressive collapse and the circular geometry.