“The President is alive but has nowhere to live.” That was U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s stark assessment of Haitian President Rene Preval’s situation Thursday and it applied to hundreds of thousands of Haitians who had survived the quake but faced immediate problems of surviving. Government buildings in Haiti were severely damaged and the nation’s infrastructure, never solid, was in tatters. “There is no communications system,” said Clinton. “We are attempting to help set up a communications capability for the government." AP Photo/Francois Mori A person's leg hangs from of a building that collapsed during the earthquake in Port-au-Prince,
Turning 50 years of talk, stalled projects and storm wreckage into a $15-billion design and construction program that has rapidly built monumental storm-surge defenses around Greater New Orleans can only be achieved with smart, steady, determined and gutsy leadership.
The year 2009 marked the midpoint and high-water mark in a seven-year-long flood of work at the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers, with $27.7 billion in construction on the military-programs side and $15.6 billion on the civil-works side.
As rescuers in Haiti struggled to locate victims of a devastating 7.0 magnitude earthquake that struck the island at 4:53 p.m. on Jan 12, the U.S. government and construction industry mobilized to assist. Photo: AP Photo/Jorge Cruz Hillside homes affected by quake in Port-au-Prince on Wednesday, Jan. 13 Photo: AP Photo/Jorge Cruz A man gestures behind a person trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building in Port-au-Prince Wednesday. Related Links: BLOG: Can you help in Haiti? Let us know U.S. engineers familiar with the Caribbean also speculated that impoverished Haiti and its structures may have existed in a seismic
The vendor that analysts say has the largest market share in supplying engineering software to the process plant industry has acquired a 25-year-old company with the most widely used pipe-stress analysis software, as well as a suite of 3D design tools for small-plant and project design. Huntsville, Ala.-based Intergraph closed the deal on Jan. 4 to purchase Houston-based COADE Holdings Inc., according to Patrick Holcomb, executive vice president of global business development in Intergraph’s process, power and marine division. COADE sold a majority stake of the firm in 2007 to Insight Venture Partners. No financial terms were disclosed. Intergraph was
Recessions may mean hard times for businesses, but they also are mothers of invention. Entrepreneurs head for their garages and workshops, and business types get busy thinking up new ways to compete. Frederick Cann, a residential and light-commercial contractor based in Medford, N.Y., has done that, and come up with www.BidForMaterials.com, a kind of dating service for contractors and suppliers. “During this recession, all us contractors have done nothing but scramble for work, and the way to get more work is to be more competitive and manage money better,” says Cann, now president of the enterprise he and two partners
Often, in nations hosting and building U.S. government facilities, U.S. armed forces engineers take plans to an early design stage and then hand off the projects to local government entities for execution, according to long-standing agreements worked out at diplomatic levels. For the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which builds in much of the world for the Army and often for the Air Force, Navy, Marines, various federal agencies and even foreign governments, agreements governing its construction tasks vary significantly. Slide Show Photo: Justin Ward Grafenwöhr buildout included Europe’s biggest PX, 12 barracks, a hotel, maintenance facilities, tank wash rack
A federal court judge in New Orleans who found the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers liable for damages claimed by five residents of an area inundated during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 limits the area to which his decision applies. But Judge Standwood R. Duval Jr. also blasts the Corps for putting lives and property at risk for decades by failing to properly operate and maintain a navigational channel it built between 1956 and 1968 below New Orleans. He further faults the Corps for failing to comply with the National Environmental Protection Act of 1969 for reporting on environmental degradation caused
The land rolls like waves as it liquefies beneath the viaduct. As spliced timber piles underpinning the columns lose lateral support, the piles buckle and some viaduct columns drop swiftly out of sight. Utilities rupture, fires break out and roadway decks collapse with shocking speed. Related Links: Simulated Quake Rattles Populace Is it a scene from a new disaster movie? No. It’s a simulation of an engineering model-driven video showing what would happen to the Seattle’s Alaskan Way Viaduct in the case of a serious earthquake. A political storm set off by the Washington State Dept. of Transportation’s release of
Lt. Gen. Robert L. Van Antwerp, chief of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, responded to a series of questions about the Corps� changing construction management style and performance by e-mail on October 31. He describes a military construction program that has just completed one of its biggest years ever, and presents metrics to support his contention that efficiency is improving. + Image Photo: USACE Comparison of Metrics for Projects Completed in FY05 and FY09 Related Links: Military Construction Is in High Gear As Big Jobs Hit Their Stride Major Boom in Army Construction Changes Base Appearances GEN. VAN ANTWERP
