Innovative Emergency Shelter Built From Plastic Tubes, Debris

"The IRC is adapting an innovative design that uses flexible, hollow plastic tubing normally used in the packaging of grains and commodities. The tubing, manufactured in rolls more than a kilometer long, is packed tight with soil and debris which is then twisted into a dome-shaped structure...The structures are an adaptation of a building technique designed by Nadir Khalili...Mr. Khalili came up with the simple dome design after studying ancient structures left standing after natural disasters. He found that domes, vaults and arches have withstood earthquakes for as long as 4,000 years..."