According to Greek mythology, Atlas fought in a war against the Greek god Zeus, and as punishment, was doomed to hold the entire heavens aloft. He's often depicted in art as holding the world on his back. Atlas, then, knows a little bit about heavy burdens.
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Atlas didn't have a hydraulic jacking system, like these movers of the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. See more lighthouse pictures.
What would he say about structural moving, or the process of lifting an entire building at the foundation and moving it elsewhere? Well, he'd probably say that these movers have the help of machines and technology. All the same, even Atlas would probably be impressed by the weight of some of the buildings on this list.
Structural moving is an increasingly common way to preserve historic buildings that might otherwise be razed to make way for development. It's also a way to place a building in a safer location if it's threatened by flooding.
While almost anything can be moved structurally, from old churches to nuclear reactors, the buildings on this list set themselves apart by their weight and, sometimes, by the difficulty of the move. Everything about these moves is big: the number of engineering hours, the budget and the equipment. It's enough to give even Atlas a headache. After all, not even Atlas had to carry the world through a crowded downtown corridor. Read on to find out about the move that went through the heart of Minneapolis.
