Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
(OP)
What does everyone think about this? I uploaded a PDF of the article. I am not sure if it worked.
Here is a paragraph from the article:
"Critics now accuse the group of covering up engineering mistakes, downplaying the need to alter building standards, and using the investigations to protect engineers and government agencies from lawsuits."
J
Here is a paragraph from the article:
"Critics now accuse the group of covering up engineering mistakes, downplaying the need to alter building standards, and using the investigations to protect engineers and government agencies from lawsuits."
J






RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
Also, no one is ever going to KNOW what happened regarding anything... We will only ever know the probable mechanisms. This applies equally to bridges, buildings, planes, trains, etc, etc, etc. Differing opinions on such matters are a close cousin to "he said, she said" and "he started it" from school yard fights, bar brawls, affairs, etc.
There are three positions: My side, your side, and the truth. This applies in all things.
B.Eng (Carleton)
Working in New Zealand, thinking of my snow covered home...
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
There are many extremely qualified experts that disagree with these gentlemen.
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
I find it interesting that they are promoting an argument that the design of buildings (pre 9/11) should have been done to protect against possible jet aircraft collision. Hindsight is 20-20 and these buildings were designed to the "standard of care" at the time. In fact, the current standard of care has changed very little as the risk of attack by hijacked jet aircraft is not a typical criteria for design of buildings today and is not being promoted by anyone that I know of. That being said, I would contend that a building code that required resistance to jumbo jet impact for every building built in the country would be quite unreasonable and should not be pursued. There are far better ways to protect against this which ASCE rightly recommended.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_care
I have read or at least scanned through most of the post Katrina reports and feel that they presented a reasonable analysis of the situation. Again, the levees were at least designed to the standard of care. They were not designed for a Cat 5 hurricane, but were thought to be adequate for the 100-year storm with a very significant factor of safety. Again, this was the standard of care and a higher standard was not considered necessary at the time.
Construction was generally done well (although there may have been some room for improvement). O&M was generally lacking. This was apparent as significant settlement in the levees was measured, but the levees were not raised to compensate for it. An overall master plan was also lacking since various segments, owned and operated by different agencies, did not function together well. One of the biggest problems was that significant wetlands which helped to buffer the coast from storm surge had been developed. The levee design had not accounted for this and again hindsight is 20-20.
I am also aware that policies and standards for levees in this country are currently changing (as a result of these reports and significant public discussion) which will greatly increase the requirements for safety for these structures in the future. Unfortunately, there are thousands of miles of existing un-certified levees in this country, some of which have marginal safety factors. The wheels of progress turn slowly and I am sure many of these levees will remain substandard far into the future. Same thing with bridges and roads. ASCE has done it's job, but until our politicians get there priorities straight, we will continue to see levee, dam and bridge failures.
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
You had some to begin with?
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
I beleive it was the fire that ensued that caused the members to buckle and therefore that is the reason it came down. As we know the Americans like to spray their steel with concrete, where as we in the UK prefer intumescent coatings or totally encasing the member in concrete.
Fact is what designer before this tragedy could have predicted a plane crashing into the tower and throwing aviation fuel everywhere - explosions ripping fire protection from the steel - fires buckling the steel, etc.
There are too many factors involved to come out with a definative answer.
R. Murphy
MICE MIStructE MASCE
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
Respect UC-Berkeley or not, it is interesting the hubris this Astaneh-Asl guy exhibits; the attitude that comes across is "My simulation said the buildings could withstand the impact of the airplanes, therefore the conclusions of other engineers that don't agree with my conclusions must somehow be tainted by conflict of interest." IMO it's one thing to say "my conclusions are different" and another to say "my conclusions are different because the other conclusions are tainted by moral or ethical deficiencies."
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
Practically speaking, how often do planes crash into skyscrapers, intentionally or not? Aside from the WTC, I believe there were only two such incidents in NYC over the past 60+ years.
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
standards and codes and publishes technical books and a glossy magazine."
What does the surface treatment of the magazine have to do with anything? So somehow the ASCE would be more ethical if their magazines were matte finish?
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
My personal opinion is that some care should be given to limiting the effects of progressive collapse in tall buildings.
No, I have not done an economic study of the impacts of such a design philosophy, and it's probably not practical, but wouldn't it be cool if, say every 15 stories, a ridid set of floors were incorporated, like with an outrigger truss, and this had the effect of limiting progressive collapse to the stories above.
Any takers?
tg
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
If we design all our buildings for impact from a 747, what happens when planes get bigger - will we need to retrofit? May be a problem to get FRP to work at 2000 degrees.
I Also like the fact that they said buildings could be designed for the impact of a 707 - it wasnt the impact that killed it, but the blast and the fire.
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
yep, sounds a little silly RIGHT NOW AT THIS MOMENT IN TIME (but maybe some day...). i just wonder what the orignal twin towers designers would have thought if someone would've said they need "well, you've designed for a 707 flying a little over it's landing approach speed when it impacts the building. i think you should increase it's weight by a factor of 5, increase the fuel capacity by a similar factor and increase the speed by factor of 3 or so."
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
This article was published in the "glossy magazine" published by ASCE 2 years BEFORE Katrina.
Is this collusion too or just engineers doing their job to identify potential problems and propose solutions that will protect the public that we ultimately serve?
RE: Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups
This Astaneh-Asl sounds like an attention hound.
Hg, underwhelmed by UCB since they snubbed me in 1997
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