Project Description
The Mazankowski Alberta Heart Institute (MAHI), a $196 million, nine-storey “hospital within a hospital,” was named after the Right Honourable Don Mazankowski, former Deputy Prime Minister of Canada, an active Conservative politician, and businessman. The Institute is a world-class centre of excellence in pediatric and adult heart disease prevention, treatment, research, and education. The MAHI establishes a distinct identity from a cluster of hospital buildings while maintaining a connection, both physically and visually, to the main hospital—the Walter C. Mackenzie Health Sciences Centre. Symbolic of the Heart Institute is a towering curtain of glass that curves around the south wall. The roof of the building features a heliport and a roof garden, with specially designed safety nets surrounding the helicopter landing pad.
Pro-Bel Technical Approach
The suspended maintenance and fall protection requirements on the MAHI project included: monorail system for cleaning interior atrium glass and maintaining electrical and mechanical appurtenances; horizontal cable lifelines for travel on the roof and to safely access work stations (davit locations); both roof rigged and ground rigged davit arms; platform stabilization buttons; and u-bar safety anchors.
A unique feature of the suspended maintenance plan involved designing a davit base system with careful consideration of how the davits would be used for lifting platforms for window cleaning/exterior building maintenance. This was due to the sloped roof edges and the helicopter pad, which had near-horizontal safety grating/netting around the pad, close to the edges of the roof. This confined area would not permit the use of roof-rigged davits. As a result, ground-rigged davit arms were designed to go behind and between the safety grating sections, an unusual situation that was ultimately and successfully resolved by the Pro-Bel engineers.
For exterior platform work, stabilization buttons (detent pins) were installed on the window mullions of the exterior building on every third floor. Stabilization of a platform, cage or boson\’s chair equipment is a system designed to keep the equipment in contact with the building\’s façade, to prevent movement. Without stabilization, worker safety could be jeopardized due to wind action, or building faces could become damaged by equipment impact.