The Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart is now officially home to the "strongest artificially generated tornado in the world".
The record attempt was confirmed in the presence of Guinness Book of Records representative Olaf Kuchenbecker. The 34.4metre-high artificial tornado serves to eliminate smoke from the museum in the event of a fire.
"We are delighted that the Mercedes-Benz Museum is now also featured in the Guinness Book of Records," said Michael Bock, manager the Museum. "By achieving the world record as `strongest artificially generated tornado in the world', the Mercedes-Benz Museum has underlined its outstanding position in the world of museums in terms of architecture."The architecture of the Museum placed particular demands on construction planners, architects and engineers with regard to smoke elimination. The fire protection regulations require all areas outside the fire level to be smoke-free in the event of a fire. However, due to the open-plan structure of the Mercedes-Benz Museum, the various exhibition areas are connected to each by an interior courtyard and ramps without any fire zones. From the perspective of smoke elimination, this presented a challenge that could not be implemented through conventional fluid mechanics.
It was necessary to take a new approach, and so a globally unique smoke elimination system was developed for the Museum. In the event of fire, 144 outlets located along the core walls inject air into the interior courtyard. This generates an artificial tornado, and the smoke collected is then discharged outside the building via a smoke elimination vent.
This procedure uses the principle of the tornado force, which has a devastating effect under natural conditions, to create a controlled life-saving form of fluid mechanics that opens up new architectural possibilities.
The Mercedes-Benz Museum was selected from among some 800 applications that are submitted each week to the Guinness Book of Records. With 110 million copies in circulation, the Guinness Book of Records has been one of the world's most successful reference works since the 1950s, and is now distributed in 20 languages and 100 countries.