The deaths of firefighters Joseph P. Graffagnino and Robert Beddia at the Deutsche Bank building at Ground Zero in 2007 needlessly replayed the tragedy that unfolded on Sept. 11, 2001, when 343 of New York’s Bravest died. The high-rise bank building, adjacent to the World Trade Center, was damaged in the attack and six years later was being cleaned of asbestos and demolished. Courtesy of the Manhattan District Attorney Fire at Deutsche bank building killed two firefighters, who succumbed to smoke inhalation struggling to get water on the fire source. Related Links: NIOSH Report on Bank Fire Deaths State Supreme
The ASCE has been dispatching teams to investigate and draw engineering lessons from disasters since the Johnstown Flood of 1889, when a private impoundment dam failed and killed 2,200 people. It has earned the highest regard for its dedication to applying impartial analysis to catastrophe and improving the standards of engineering practice through its findings. ASCE's current roll out of seven sequential teams to gather data and parse lessons from Japan's powerful March 11 earthquake and the subsequent devastating tsunami is the latest example. The information to be gleaned from the wreckage of bent steel and shattered concrete is of
You have to look only a short distance behind the rhetoric to get to the fundamental issues surrounding hydraulic fracturing in the shale gas reserves around the U.S. The reasonable path is to finish the federal research, tightly regulate the drilling and push forward with innovations that could make shale gas the least objectionable option among a variety of unattractive options when it comes to the energy and environmental future of the U.S. Any hard look at the subject should include the overall greenhouse-gas footprint of shale gas, particularly now that a Cornell University research team has suggested the footprint
Trying to control nature is a human trait, and engineers have much to say about how to do it. There will be many lessons drawn from the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan, but one issue that should receive greater attention is the failure of land-use rules to protect coastal communities. It would be surprising if this factor were overlooked, given how much thought is devoted to sustainability and preserving nature, not to mention how much is already known about the way population density increases the destruction caused by tidal waves. Plainly, better land-use rules could have saved
The arguments that in decades past helped produce record-breaking surface transportation authorizations don’t work any more. Not even the gas tax and the Highway Trust Fund, which make drivers pay and keep the money separate from other taxes, are sacrosanct. Transportation now needs a plan just to get by. After that, we should invigorate the user-fee concept with an eye toward replacing it with a vehicle-miles-traveled tax plan. If we require another sign of the need for change, we received it on the first day of the new Congress. The GOP-dominated House of Representatives adopted new rules that will allow
As young Gabe Spencer pictured here joins his mother for a construction jobsite ceremony, his hardhat isn’t regulation. But his clear fascination with the building process at age five might encourage us to think that the construction industry still has fans in the next generation. Hopefully, we can convince these kids that construction will continue as a good place to pursue a career when they grow up. Photographer/Submitter: Marc BarnesSubmitted while Barnes was with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers; he now works for the new U.S. Army Community Hospital at Fort Belvoir, Va. Gabe Spencer watches intently as his
For many small and medium-sized firms, 2010 might be remembered as a long reality show similar to TV’s “Survivor.” Faced with the possibility of elimination amid a fragile economy as construction unemployment hovered around 18%, many companies rethought market plans and business approaches. Almost everyone’s top line shrank, but that was fine if it meant staying in business and minimizing layoffs. Image: Slaved-fotolia.com Bigger companies found opportunities in the downturn to plot new strategies. Consolidation didn’t rest. AECOM Technology Corp. and URS Corp. led the industry in big acquisitions. In June, URS Corp. outlasted CH2M-Hill in a bidding war for
Many times we’ve written that engineers should unite around causes such as the need for more spending on infrastructure and qualifications-based selection. When it comes to other matters, such as the importance of licensed practice and licensed engineering professors, we’re reminded that engineering is divided among numerous disciplines with their own needs and agendas. Engineering is sprawling and diverse, more like India than Switzerland. Engineers can never be as culturally coherent or politically unified as physicians, attorneys or architects. But this state of affairs doesn’t mean engineering has split into so many loosely related camps that one sector has no
New Jersey Gov. Christopher Christie (R) has thrown an ice-cold bucket of water on the heads of the sleeping Rip Van Winkles in New York and New Jersey. These folks trusted the planned commuter-rail Hudson River tunnel was somehow beyond the reach of the current backlash against government spending and deficits. However, that exemption has turned out not to be the case in the bitter election season just concluded. The project’s construction packages, several of which had been awarded, included an underground addition to Manhattan’s Pennsylvania Station and a bridge on the New Jersey side. We believe the project eventually
Airline passengers bearing one-way tickets often elicit a closer look from airport security. Thus, U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials at San Francisco International Airport considered it a routine search when they stopped a man with a one-way ticket from China. Stuffed in his suitcases were 1,500 circuit breakers, all counterfeit. According to industry experts familiar with the case, the man was a former employee of Square D, a large manufacturer of electrical components in Palatine, Ill. Officials later discovered that another shipment of one million counterfeit Square D breakers had slipped past security, spreading through the marketplace like a
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