Julian Sharpe had a box full of ideas about disaster survival after the Indonesian tsunami. He wanted to build personal units for people to survive in a major disaster. After the Japanese tsunami of 2011 he was inspired to move from the idea phase to manufacturing. Sharpe and his team have developed the Survival Capsule, a doomsday survival pod.
The requirements for the design were to be lightweight, strong, resistant to temperature extremes, and able to pass a full regiment of aerospace testing. The company’s website states that Large Object Impact, Sharp Object Penetration, Drop Test, Flammability Tests and Water Penetration tests are run on the capsules. The frame is built from 6061 aluminum and the shell from 5052.
Racing seats with four point harnesses are included in the pod, along with storage space for water and five days of supplies. Lights, a GPS location system, and air supply tanks are also present. Each capsule is fitted with a purchased marine door, ventilation vents, window and a stand for the pod when not in use. The color is intended to be high-visibility for easy retrieval after the disaster has passed. Options exist for two, four, six, eight or ten occupants in the capsules and recommended installation sites are gardens, parking lots, or roofs. The ten person capsule is an 8 foot diameter sphere while two occupants sit in a 4.5 foot diameter space.
Survival Capsules are further down the product development path than the Ecocapsule from yesterday but still seem far away from production with several question marks in terms of testing and durability. The product looks good and professionally done and I’d like to think that capsules can be commercially available in a few years. Several other videos exist online but this one showcased the construction and testing of the system.
Sharpe and his team initially won Comsol’s Create the Future contest’s Popular Vote in 2011, and have been getting recognition in different forms over the past four years. I heard buzz this year when Italian explorer Alex Bellini partnered with Survival Capsule as part of Adrift 2015, his year long stunt to live on an iceberg. Several other doomsday pods exist, from Picomdesign’s Emergency Capsule to Randy Harper’s Rescue Pod to MobyKraft’s build-your-own MKPOD1.