A monolithic dome home on the beach in Pensacola, Fla., has survived three hurricanes.
Credit: Monolithic Dome Institute

A monolithic dome offers some protection against common problems associated with flooding such as mold, according to industry officials.
Credit: Monolithic Dome Institute

Mobile home residents throughout Licking County in Ohio will be breathing a little easier next year when severe weather or tornadoes threaten their area thanks to what is being described as a first-in-the-nation governmental plan to build monolithic domes as storm shelters.

"We're trying to save lives and prevent injuries," said Jim Mickey, an environmental planner with the county who has been working on the project for two years. "Anything you can do to reduce the risk for people and their property has to be a good thing."

The cost of the six monolithic domes – steel-reinforced concrete structures – will be split 80-20 between the federal government and the mobile home park owners. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has approved a grant of $776,000 for the domes, which will be erected at six separate sites.

Licking County, the second largest county in Ohio and located east of Columbus, is the first governmental agency to order monolithic domes for storm shelters, according to David B. South, president of the Monolithic Dome Institute in Italy, Texas.

The domes, which will range in size from approximately 32 feet in diameter up to 50 feet in diameter – roughly 800 to 2,000 square feet - will be welcomed by the storm-plagued area, Mickey said.

The county is ranked tenth in the state for tornado activity, having experienced 17 tornadoes in the last half century, the county Emergency Management Agency reported. It said the area has also experienced 111 severe thunderstorms in the same period. Total property damage from the severe weather totaled more than $33 million; the storms left four dead and dozens injured.

Mobile home parks and their residents are particularly vulnerable to the storms, Mickey said.

"Obviously one of the higher risk areas you would have are mobile home parks," he said. "I would say they're pretty much at the mercy of the elements."

Based on the county's demographics, nearly 40 percent of the total population of some 156,000 is in what Mickey described as the "high risk category" of under age 16 years of age or over age 65.

"I anticipate that would be consistent with population of mobile home parks as well," he said.

Mickey said some 40 mobile home parks in the county were contacted about the domes and six agreed to go forward with the project. He said some of the others may have backed out due to the cost.

Even so, residents where the domes will be located should feel safer knowing that a shelter was nearby, he said.

"I would think that absolutely it would be a comfort to know that when the next tornado event or when the sirens go off or when severe weather approaches that should it be necessary, there's a shelter . . . that can provide emergency shelter for everyone in immediate vicinity," Mickey said

While the domes will be located at mobile home parks, they will be accessible to anyone, he noted.

"The way we wrote the grant was that we had in mind that anyone stuck out in the elements could seek shelter in the facility," he said. "If you had the cable TV guy up a ladder doing cable repair and the sky turns black and the sirens start going off, obviously he would want to get down from the ladder and seek appropriate shelter. It's not just limited to mobile home residents."

The domes can also be used for community activities within the mobile home parks.

"That would be up to the discretion of the mobile home park owner," Mickey said. "But they need to be ready at a moment's notice when they're pressed into service based on a tornado warning or a severe weather warning."

The shelters, designed for about three-hours of use during a storm, will be stocked with water and be have rest room facilities. They are expected to be constructed in early 2008.

While the domes are reported to be the first such structures being used as tornado and severe weather shelters in the Midwest, they have been used in more severe conditions including hurricanes and earthquakes, both Mickey and South said.

The monolithic domes have also been used for homes, schools, churches, storage facilities and sports and commercial applications.

South, who has been involved with dome design for 31 years and said he invented the monolithic design, said the structures make ideal disaster-resistant buildings.

He said a monolithic dome designed as a hurricane shelter for DuPont in Delisle, Miss., withstood Hurricane Katrina while the more than two dozen people inside the shelter "slept right through it." The DuPont plant suffered some $100 million in damages.

"Its time is coming," South said of the design. "It's on the very forefront. They've very well proved they can handle the loads. One of the reasons they're proved it is we have quite a few we've buried and the pressure on them is three to five times what you get in a wind event."

South said his domes can be found in nearly every state in the U.S. and in 40 countries. He also trains and teaches people about monolithic dome design.

"My goal in life is to make the world go round," he said, referring to the shape of his buildings.

The cost to construct a monolithic dome is substantially less than a conventional shelter, he said, noting that a dome could cost from $110 to $120 a square foot compared to $240 a square foot for a conventional shelter.

"They (domes) take half as much material," he said. "A concrete flat wall takes three times as much material to make a flat wall as strong as curved wall."

He said the energy savings on a dome could pay for the facility within 20 years.

"These are greenest things around," South contended. "The energy footprint is just a fraction of a conventional building."

Mickey said the monolithic domes were a good investment for the county.

"Every dollar we spend on mitigation and projects like the tornado and severe weather shelters saves us $4 to $5 of future costs, so this is basically an investment in Licking County for many years to come," he said.

Related Links:

• Monolithic Dome Institute

• Licking County Emergency Emergence Management Agency