New Zealand Engineering 1997 October

Letters To The Editor

Letters to the editor can be sent to:

Letters,
New Zealand Engineering
Freepost 3938
PO Box 12-241, Wellington or emailed to Peter@ipenz.org.nz

Letters should be wise, witty and brief. The editor reserves the right to seek replies, edit and not publish letters.

Public Awareness of Professionals

The fundamental ignorance of Society of the professional engineering process expounded by Tony Gibson in his article in the June 1996 edition is still persisting well.

On the "60 Minutes" programme on TV1 on 20 July, there was an item on a farmer's bridge failure. The bridge had been built for him by the army who had told him that the timber was untreated and would have to be maintained accordingly.

Unsurprisingly, it was not maintained, and about 10 years later collapsed and killed a beekeeper whose vehicle fell into the river below.

The farmer apparently regarded the failure as an "Act of God", so too did the coroner and various other people who became interested. None seemed to appreciate that such a structure should be examined by a competent person from time to time.

Viewers were invited to comment. I therefore wrote the following letter, which was not apparently considered worthy of comment the following week, when viewers letters were discussed. So an opportunity to avoid a further similar accident occurring elsewhere was missed.

To 60 Minutes TV1.

Berryman's Bridge

It seems to me an important point is being overlooked by everyone contributing to this item.

This failure shares with Cave Creek the same lack of appreciation by everyone concerned, farmers and coroner alike, that all load bearing structures should not only be designed by, but also regularly examined by, a qualified engineer.

Had a professional engineer seen this bridge before the inevitable collapse, he/she would now be on a criminal charge.

D W King, Rangiora