Engineer Society Accused of Cover - Ups

[jechols]

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

 

[youngstructural]

There will always be skeptics, just as there are always fool. (Implication intended)

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...

 

[frv]

I just lost a little respect for UC Berkely.

 

[jike]

This sounds more like a political argument than a technical one. Look at the players.

There are many extremely qualified experts that disagree with these gentlemen.

 

[cvg]

as usual, the press will report things that they feel will boost readership. Not necessarily a fair and objective reporting of all the facts and opinions. And in a world run by politicians and corporations, public policy is always affected by personal interests.

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.

 

[Lion06]

How realistic is it to DESIGN for an airplane flying into a building? I mean, how many possible iterations can you run through of taking out columns and beams on a given floor and finding alternate load paths? It seems you might be able to design the structure to stand if several KNOWN members are destroyed, but what if twice as many columns are taken out where you weren't expecting it. It just seems completely unrealistic to me.

 

[JAE]

I just lost a little respect for UC Berkely.

You had some to begin with?

 

[rmurph17]

Well from my understanding (which is my understanding so dont quote me), I beleived that the twin towers structural design was adequate. I dont think that the force of the impact or anything relating to the impact or physical destruction to the members was the fault of the collapse.

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

 

[frv]

Some rogue professors aside, Berkely is a great school- especially in engineering.

 

[prost]

Just as you cannot design airplanes to be as rugged as the black boxes (there isn't enough thrust in current engines to build airplanes as hardened as the black boxes), you cannot design even tall expensive buildings to withstand every possible scenario for induced damage. That much is clear. All you can do is develop reasonable design standards and hold everyone to those standards. Now that an 800 passenger airplane has been built, should every skyscraper built from now on, into perpetuity, be built to withstand a 500 mile per hour impact with a 1.5million pound airplane (700,000 kilos), fully loaded with flammable jet fuel?

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."

 

[bridgebuster]

A number of years ago one of the designers for the Verrazano-Narrows told me that the towers had to withstand the impact of a Boeing 707. That was required because the bridge is near JFK airport (Idelwild, at the time of design).

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.

 

[prost]

Anybody catch the snotty sounding "It sets engineering
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?

 

[trainguy]

AS far as 9/11 and the WTC goes,

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

 

[csd72]

The WTC was designed for a plane impact, just not anything as big as the one that crashed into it.

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.

 

[kslee1000]

I agree with CVG, the press is not always reliable. I believe all the Civil/Structural Engineers would like to know/examine the two professors' findings and arguments, I think they shall publish theirs works to clear the air.

 

[msucog]

based on the argument presented in the article, i think we should not be designing to withstand just plane crashes...we should be designing to withstand the flying buildings that will exist 100 years from now and may be highjacked by rogue panda bears....

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."

 

[DRC1]

Berkley is a leading Geotechnical University. Dr. Seed is a prominent Geotechnical Engineer. The debate is not about whose design is right. It is about how the Society should handle forensic investigations. Dr. Seed's letter is very disturbing.

 

[Umassengr]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1478690/posts

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?

 

[HgTX]

I also like how they portray ASCE as some unified group with a single goal.

This Astaneh-Asl sounds like an attention hound.

Hg, underwhelmed by UCB since they snubbed me in 1997

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