Thursday, September 6, 2007

The Awesome Presence

From the ground it’s hard to escape the awe that the looming presence of a cooling tower can impose on you. Stand close to one of these monsters and they will work their magic on you. Even if you’re not looking directly at one you can feel it’s power and it’s presence and it doesn’t even have to be in operation for it to have that affect on you.

I’ve been around power stations and their associated cooling towers during construction and even then, when they’ve been quiet and out of service there is a presence that is hard to escape from. And it doesn’t matter how close you are to them … even in the distance they impose themselves on their surroundings and on those who are looking at them.