@thefutureisnow: Metal frame and living coral would get my vote, but I think concrete will be a lot more likely. I can't wait for the environmentalists to scream bloody murder if this ever sees the light of day.

theimmc

Or for about a quarter the materials you could raise your gizmo 150 feet out of the water.

PastorDoodah

@tkohrs2002: they say the world pool current would be so strong it would pull it around the whole thing and fling it out the other side... I'll believe it when i see it.

yungjerry703

I can just picture it. Tsunami warning, sirens wailing, lights flashing, and columns of pillars rise slowly from the seabed. Very anime-ish.

theimmc

Make it out of paper mache, that should keep costs low.

7raczyk

My guess is aluminum. But it's not the material that matters, it's the gaps between the pillars

shockwaver

@LastAndLeast:
But it probably works better than a wall. A wall would have to absorb all the energy from a wave, this looks like it would just deflect the energy of the wave, and hardly absorb any of the wave.

Suttin

It does not say the material it is made from, any ideas?

thefutureisnow

@tkohrs2002: I was going to bring up this point too.

unibrow4o9

Seems like a lot more work than a wall.

LastAndLeast

they have probably thought of this already......buuuuut....What if the wave is huge and goes over those barrier?

tkohrs2002

this will be in Dubai like next week... they build everything else there

youngjjohnson

Video demo?

kmkl

@PastorDoodah: or for $0 you could do nothing because anyone who has the balls to work on an oil rig in the ocean probably doesnt care about losing their life

tkohrs2002

@theimmc: Awesome.

eblingmis

@theimmc:

I dunno, this could provide an artificial reef to marine life making it more attractive to environmentalists.

Maddrjeffe

@youngjjohnson: Will this be before or after their dinosaur theme park?

Xaldian

@Suttin: Yeah, this seems like it would work.

eblingmis

Light waves = Ocean waves?

smartboydan hates college

@addiktion: Yea, awesome, imagine if we were fighting those people on American soil. That would be way better.

fastm3driver

The circular formation could be used to protect anything from oil rigs to islands, though very few islands can probably afford the amount of pillars needed to make this effect work.
if i'm going to build my secret base on a volcanic island in the middle of the ocean, i'm damn well gonna cloak it from the waves.

willyolio

@youngjjohnson:

True that. At least debai actually spends it's money on useful things that are hell of a lot more productive then this gay arse war we're in.

Seriously imagine if we took that war money and rebuilt some infrastructure in America. Imagine what cool building we could have here. We're so 20th century.

addiktion

@smartboydan hates college:

My guess is it has to do with interference patterns or something of the such. In any case the science that applies to one type of wave applies to another. It's one of the reason's the wave is so interesting.

Morberis

Neat idea, but I can't help but imagine that a tsunami will likely take out the pillars as well, and send a hundred, giant pillars raining down into the middle section. :)

sodakar

Whoever said a wall would work is right...love the idea but problem is that if one of those inner pillars goes down in the process, then everything inside may be more f'd than would be without the pillars in the first place.

integrate

@PastorDoodah:
ohhoho...

it doesn't take ME anything to raise MY gizmo 150 feet out of the... *cough*... water...

ifyouknowwhatImean...

tehdahl

this kind of installation will do nothing to lighten the cost of oil at all, will it.

Overheal

What good is an island if you can't see the ocean horizon?

nocar

@integrate: scratch what I said about the wall...this PLUS a inner wall would be better as there would be much less direct force on the wall.

integrate

Somebody tell New Orleans!! Ooo... too late.

nuclearlove

@nuclearlove:

and that may have been too early, stfu!

br4nd0n

@nuclearlove: You mean "too soon?"

newtype2011

@tkohrs2002: It's an evolution of the already-existant slosh plates. The pillars may not even need to be above the water's surface: as a wave passes over/through the array its energy gets gently spread around so its not so concentrated in one point.

Kit Eaton

@youngjjohnson: The New Scientist article this is linked from has a quote by a guy saying the same thing.

Molbork

Ocean waves are a natural process that help to circulate nutrients and waste throughout. Wouldn't this basically create a giant dead zone around the area?

elliso92

@youngjjohnson: LOL! you can be certain of that!! and it will be 2 kilometers high!

Ariel_Wollinger

So explain to me how this is invisibility?

The_Gas_Man

@elliso92: Damn, beat me to the punch on that one. I wonder if there are any studies on how this would affect ocean life. Especially since coastal areas are prime location for fishing villages and such. And what about the poor surfers???

OneMHz

@The_Gas_Man: it bends waves around an object instead of them bouncing off it.

yungjerry703

The_Gas_Man: invisibility in the sense that the ocean waves never hit the island, but they also don't get reflected back out (as they would with a circular wall). Someone looking at just the waves (as opposed to a light image) wouldn't see the island at all. It would be invisible.

LoreleiRadassical

Wouldn't ships hit the damn invisible pillars? Or did you mean something else?

LiquidGravity

@fastm3driver: terrorism is just not a threat.

Ariel_Wollinger

@Suttin: How about a wedge shapped wall?

Optimus-Prime

@theimmc: I guess they need to really get moving with the giant humanoid robots then.

Null42

@The_Gas_Man: See the thing is that all those pillars will become invisible once they are under water!!!

WD40

It looks like the pillars would break up the oncoming waves. A wall would simply take a beating. I remember PopScience article a long time ago using underwater baffles to dampen the waves.

I'm sure they could also use these pillars to harness energy of the waves. It could help with the cost.

madara

@Overheal: I suspect it would, if you consider that during the recent Hurricane Ike alone, we lost 10 oil rigs. The costs to repair/replace those is obviously significant.

Ridgerunner

@Ariel_Wollinger: You're right... that little explosion at the Marriott in Pakistan must've just been a mistake. There's no such thing as terrorism.

Ridgerunner

Am i the only one that sees the fatal flaws in this design? First of all, how are ships going to get onto the island? Building materials, produce, transportation? Second of all, doesn't this completely destroys one of the major advantages of living on a tropical island, the view?

DriscollSnass

@DriscollSnass: they can be entirely under the water, maintaining views. Hell I bet these could be seeded with coral and turned into a great reef system.

The Chad

@Ridgerunner: But it was 10 out of over 3,500 operating rigs, apparently. Not a high percentage. A co-worker and I looked it up, and we were surprised by the number of rigs in the Gulf.

CSX321

@fastm3driver: Was Iraq going to invade the USA? I never heard about that.

elvisml2

@fastm3driver: Lol, you don't have to worry your little head about that. Cuz that is merely a defense contractor's wet dream, and a right wing scare tactic.

bpapa9013

@Ridgerunner: When did Pakistan become the 51st state? They've got their own problems, shall we invade there next? (i.e. overthrow whoever fills the power vacuum left by Musharif, not just send spec-ops over the border after OBL)...

bpapa9013

Geniuses; I'm pretty sure the point of this is that it would sit on the ocean floor, and the drag caused by the pillars dampens immense waves to near nothingness. If the pillars were meant to extend all the way to the surface, a single ring would be more cost effective. Just like Planet Druidia.

Ni Tsu Alien

If they can build a pillar to withstand the force of a Tsunami, why don't they just build a platform that's as strong as the pillar itself? Better yet, why not have a platform that rises and lowers like Stromberg's in "the Spy Who Loved Me?"

Guapo

@kmkl: Ditto!

Ben Zvan

@Guapo: It doesn't "withstand" the force of the Tsunami, it re-directs it. That's why a wall is a horrible idea. It just gets beat on and beat on and beat on. This idea dissipates the force of the Tsunami around the target.

ninjamurf

@elvisml2:

We're at war *in* Iraq, not *with* Iraq.

nocturnus

@Ariel_Wollinger:

Definately not.
Wasn't seven years ago, wont be seven years from now.

nocturnus

@theimmc: Sexy - Kinda like Evangelion!

phoenix27

@sodakar:
lol

ishook

@LiquidGravity: Heh. The pillars aren't invisible in visible spectrum, they are invisible to waves of the ocean. It's all the rage in Harry Potter 9: The Quest to Bang a Mermaid.

solOptimus

@elliso92: My first thought too. However in the event of a spill at a rig, it might help to contain it.

shoeless

@solOptimus: I think I saw that in the, uhh, "bookstore"...

Con Seannery

@sodakar: But, make em from chocolate, and you can hire Tay Zonday to sing at it...

Con Seannery

@willyolio: Can we collaborate on this base, my funds all went to volcano insurance, I can't get the cloaking sticks.

Con Seannery

@kmkl: But it's invisible....

Con Seannery

@Con Seannery: hmmmm....I, too, have an uncle

jakebathman

@Con Seannery:

NOOOOoooooOooooOOOOoooOOOoooooo...

kmkl

This is why NYC would do well in a tsunami, too.

zingbot

@Optimus-Prime: For a wedge shaped wall, you need to predict where the wave is coming from. If it's a coast line, then a wedge is fine, but for something in open water exposed to waves from all directions, this approach seems better.

ugar