Summer Travel: Dubai, Kuwait and France

Back from a bit of a hiatus. Since my last blog, I traveled to Dubai to visit LCS civil engineering undergraduates working as summer interns at the Dubai Contracting Company. The interns are doing great, having a terrific time, and getting to know Mr. Abdallah Yabroudi '78, G'79, the CEO of DCC and a graduate of the LCS Civil Engineering program. Dubai is a center of commerce for the Middle East and new buildings are going up one after another.


In the morning, the students are working on DCC construction sites at the Rolex Tower, the 014 Tower (a.k.a. the “Swiss Cheese” building), and the Kingdom of Sheba residential complex. In the afternoons, when temperatures often top 110 degrees, the interns are learning about contracting, cost-estimating, and project management from top DCC managers. As Lauren Seelbach, one of the interns said “It was great to work on construction projects in an area with such a high volume of innovative and unique building. Wherever you looked, there was an example of every phase of the construction process, from foundations to finishes. You can’t find that in a textbook.”

After Dubai, our group flew on to Kuwait to attend an alumni event. We were met at the Kuwait airport by a remarkable alumnus, Iman Al Qatami. Iman was a student at the American University of Beirut in the mid 1970’s when the Lebanese civil war broke out. Iman and her friends transferred to Syracuse University to escape the war. Not only did Iman adapt well to the United States, but she was invited to join the Syracuse women’s basketball team and became team captain. Today Iman lives in Kuwait City and is the Asst. Managing Director for Anwar Al Qatami & Company.

This picture shows some of the remarkable women who attended the alumni get-together – most hold management-level positions in Kuwait. It was a wonderful evening, and I am hoping to spend more time with our terrific alumni in the Gulf States in the future.

copyright cambridge2000.com

On the way back to Syracuse, I stopped in France to see the stunning Roman aqueduct at Pont du Gard. Built between 40 and 60 AD under the empires of Nero and Claude, this massive stone structure is a 49 m high bridge over the River Gardon. It is topped with a water channel capable of carrying 400 liters/sec from the natural springs in the country-side to the thirsty residents of the great Roman city of Nimes. The bridge has three tiers of arches placed atop each other, forming a link between cliffs on either side of the river. This amazing piece of engineering was built by over 1000 workers without mortar or cement and stands today as arguably the most impressive feat of Roman engineering.

One of the best things about the site is that it is completely open to the public. We walked across the aquaduct (over the very stones that were laid 2000 years ago!) and explored the woods and hills, following the path of the aqueduct. The site has been named a World Heritage Site by the United Nations and has a terrific museum with simulations of the construction process and representations of the bridge over the ages. One of my favorites is a painting by Hubert Robert, 1787.

It struck me that between the Pont du Gard and the Eiffel Tower and the Pompidou Museum in Paris, France has many engineering marvels to visit. Perhaps this is fitting, as France was home to many great mathematicians and engineers such as Fermat, Laplace, Fourier, Poincare, Carnot, and Coriolis.

Global efforts to protect critical infrastructure from terrorist attacks and disasters

Greetings from Europe!
I’ve just had two days of meetings in London. I joined representatives from the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and their counterparts from Great Britain, Canada, and Australia to share ideas about how to prevent catastrophic failures of critical infrastructure . We’re here because governments around the globe worry that the electric power grid or the water distribution system, among others, may fail during a natural disaster or a terrorist attack. The multitude of failures and the ensuing chaos that resulted from Hurricane Katrina and 9/11 have helped to fuel these concerns. (Douglas Brinkley’s book “The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast” by Douglas Brinkley,” 2005, gives an excellent review of the events surrounding Hurricane Katrina).

Our conversations are focused on computer simulation models that predict how critical infrastructures will fare if they are subject to a disaster. Modelers imagine threat scenarios (for example, a magnitude 7.5 earthquake hitting southern California) and then run the models to see what types of interventions would be helpful in preventing damage and loss of life. Interventions can be measures like strengthening building foundations, or adding sensors to detect malicious activities, or evacuating an area after a toxic chemical has been released into the air. DHS has a list of the scenarios it worries about the most and uses the models to simulate: (http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/National_Preparedness_Guidelines.pdf, p. 37).

In London this week, at the meeting in London, modelers and managers of modelers from all over the world came together to share information about state-of-the–art methods in critical infrastructure modeling in their countries. The Representatives from the United States talked about the 100+ models they have developed to represent various infrastructure systems. These models are run by Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, New Mexico. (Students, take note: Sandia has an internship program for engineering students. See http://www.sandia.gov/employment/special-prog/index.html)

One thing we agreed upon at the meeting is that engineers by themselves cannot create the best infrastructure models: we need the help of “subject matter experts” who understand the individual infrastructures such as medical personnel for the public health system and police for the public safety system. Together, working as a team, the subject matter experts and the engineers can create realistic models (programmed in Java, or a software program like VENSIM for systems dynamics modeling). With these models, we can predict things like expected loss of life, the amount of money lost to the economy, and the number and types of infrastructure elements (like an electrical power plant) that will be damaged.

A good example of a useful model is the one that DHS created for the pandemic flu in 2006. The outbreak never occurred, but the same model is being re-run for the HiN1 virus threat. The results go directly to President Obama’s advisors to figure how to react to a swine flu epidemic. You can read about the model that is being used and the results of the study at: http://www.sandia.gov/nisac/docs/PI_FINAL_1-25-08_unlimited.pdf.

Welcome to my blog

My name is Dr. Laura J. Steinberg, and I’m Dean of SU’s L.C. Smith College of Engineering and Computer Science (LCS). This is the first installment of periodic blogs from me. My Dean’s blog will focus on topics of interest to LCS students and alumni – things like my upcoming visit to London and Milan to talk about how scientists and engineers model the effects of terrorism attacks and natural disasters on urban infrastructure. On occasion, my blog might even be a bit whimsical – you may find a description of a play at Syracuse Stage, or of a snowshoe trek I took at Beaver Lake Park. As often as possible, I’ll offer websites where you can follow-up for more information.

I’ll also report on some things that are happening at the College. For example, you’ll hear about the LCS plans for convocation, and I’ll introduce you virtually to our graduation speakers. Over the summer, the blog will keep you updated on some of special events we are planning for the next academic year. Eventually, we’ll offer a forum for you to respond.

One of the reasons why I want to talk with you on this blog is that there is so much happening in the world of engineering that I would like to share with you. This is a very exciting time to be an engineer: so many of the issues the world is focused on will need engineering and technology to help address them. For example: we need to create secure cyber-infrastructure to prevent hacking into our most personal information; we need to find ways of capturing, storing, and using alternative forms of energy; we have challenges in protecting our country from natural and manmade disasters and in protecting our GI’s on the battlefield; and much of the world is thirsting for reliable water supplies and in need of medical breakthroughs.

At the same time, the world of engineering work itself is changing. With more computerization and globalization, more of the engineer’s time is spent managing, coordinating, and interpreting than ever before. With much of the mundane work of engineering now done by computers or even by engineers living “offshore,” the engineer has more time to focus on difficult design issues and on managing the design and analysis process. And, engineers are spending more time working in groups and engaging with public policy makers, rather than living a “solitary “ life at the drafting board. These changes mean that engineers will need to develop their capabilities in teamwork, communication, and big-picture thinking very early in their careers. It will be a challenge for engineering schools to meet these developmental needs during the four years students are at school. In upcoming editions of this blog, I will talk more about how LCS can best prepare our students for life as engineers or in other professions in the 21st century

As I was thinking about starting this blog, I was excited to see a piece about the future of engineering in the April 12, 2009 edition of the New York Times. Imagine my surprise when the piece, entitled “With Finance Disgraced, Which Career Will Be King?” began with these sentences, “In the Depression, smart college students flocked into civil engineering to design the highway, bridge, and dam-building projects of those days. In the Sputnik era, students poured into the sciences as America bet on technology to combat the cold war challenge.” As Steve Lohr writes in the article, this pattern is returning after a hiatus when many of the best college students studied finance and business consulting. “Science could well rise in the new pecking order of career status. The Obama Administration wants to double federal spending in basic research over 10 years and triple the number of graduate fellowships in science.” Quoting Dr. Eric Roberts of Stanford University, Lohr writes, “What we need to do is to broadly educate as many people as possible in science, so the most talented people find their way into the field. “

So, students, as you begin your studies for your exams this week, consider this: the world awaits your ideas and your expertise. There is much to be done.

I’ll be back at this spot later this week, when I’ll be reporting from London.

Sincerely,
Dean Steinberg