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August 2006

Jeff Rubenstone is a recent graduate of the College of William and Mary, where he majored in history. He is pursuing a career in journalism and is based in Sparkill, N.Y.

Overdue Diligence?
By Jeff Rubenst
August 31, 2006

These days, no one's going to make the mistake of believing the letters BP also stand for best practices.

Earlier this month, British Petroleum discovered corrosion in the pipeline system leading out of the United States' largest oil field, and announced a halt in production until repairs could be made. With the sudden loss of 400,000 barrels of oil per day, a full 8% of the United States' production, there was considerable public outrage. Yet the shock subsided after production was partially restored to western half of the pipeline system. BP officials are optimistic normal flow will be restored soon and say the corrosion is isolated.

BP became administrator of the Prudhoe Bay oil fields in 1992, and shares ownership primarily with Exxon-Mobil and Conoco-Phillips. The company only discovered the current corrosion problems after a significant oil spill in March and subsequent tests revealed that at least 16 miles of pipeline needed to be replaced.

As to why this was not detected earlier, BP has offered no definitive answers.

In a recent interview with ENR.com, Alfred Crouch, an expert in pipeline monitoring technologies, describes several methods by which pipelines can be surveyed for early signs of corrosion and damage.

BP officials later admitted, after some cajoling by reporters, that sections of the pipeline had not been inspected or properly cleaned in more than a decade, in some cases dating back to the beginning of their tenure as administrator. Some BP employees have even come forward and acknowledged that cost-cutting decisions made in the last decade often translated to cutbacks in maintenance for the pipeline systems.

It's hard to nail down exactly when chronic laziness and short-sighted cost-cutting becomes criminal negligence. While BP was running the pipeline systems with maintenance schedules more relaxed than what the pipeline suppliers and builders recommend, company officials claim that this is not unusual in the oil industry. Congressional hearings on the Prudhoe Bay shutdown are set to begin soon, and a separate investigation has been launched by Alaska's attorney general. In New York, some of BP's American investors filed a civil lawsuit against the company chiefs.

Access to oil is a touchy subject for the American people, and regardless of whatever weak excuses companies executives mumble after screw-ups, the oil must flow to its destination and not end up on the ground or in the sea. It isn't worth risking spills and production shut-downs just to shave a few dollars, or a few million dollars, off the quarterly financial report.

Especially when the potential cost includes bringing the wrath of the American public upon themselves.

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Angelle Bergeron is a New Orleans resident and freelance journalist and photographer. Her work appears frequently in Engineering News-Record, Architectural Record and South Central Construction.

Looking Back at Katrina: "It's as Real as if It Happened Yesterday"
By Angelle Bergeron
August 29, 2006

After Hurricane Katrina passed, Max Williams went looking for his house. When he couldn't find it, he went to see how the company he's worked for the past 34 years had fared. When he got to Gulf Coast Pre-Stress in Pass Christian Industrial Park Wednesday morning, a few employees were already there milling about, picking through debris and trying to sort out where to begin cleaning up. "I had two pairs of shorts, a pair of shoes I borrowed and a T-shirt," Williams says, laughing, like the devastation of a year ago was already well behind him.

Sitting in the newly refurbished offices of Gulf Coast Pre-Stress, talking to him and Mike Spruill, president and CEO, I wonder at his optimism and cheerfulness. A few months after the storm, when I was dealing with my own shock and trauma from living elsewhere and trying to decide what sorts of repairs to make on my New Orleans home, I had talked to Williams for a story for the special hurricane report of Louisiana Contractor Magazine. "You need to come down here and see for yourself," he admonished me on the telephone. I could hear the anger in his voice and resisted the urge to respond with my own. I thought, well, the water just moved in and out over there. You got to go home the next day. But, of course, he didn't have a home. Someone told me the only thing Williams found was his refrigerator.

I couldn't empathize very much at the time. Two weeks after the storm, while camped out at the Army Corps of Engineers New Orleans District Headquarters office with ENR editors Andy Wright and Tom Sawyer and photographer Michael Goodman, Sawyer managed to hitch us a ride with a state trooper. She was kind enough to zigzag a path through the un-watered portions of the city so I could assess the damage to my house. My street was still flooded. As we stood at the corner of Esplanade Avenue, I remember reaching out my arm, over the murky water, as though I could touch my house in the second block. I moved forward, and I remember the state trooper telling me that if I went in the water, I wasn't getting back in her car. I had left my boots behind that day. I longed for my kayak, which, as far as I knew, was still safely tucked in my garage. I suppose other souls would have just waded forward, without permission, and then figured out their next move after checking out the house. I had no vehicle. The city was under martial law. My two dogs were locked in a cabin an hour and a half away, at the mercy of strangers. As far as I knew, I had no money, house or possessions. I had no hope, except to continue on the only path open to me—work. So I returned with Sawyer, Goodman and the trooper and went back to work.

I returned to my home a week later, almost three weeks after Katrina hit. The waterline on the front door is about a foot and a half high, so I knew I would be able to salvage some of my possessions. I wandered around for about an hour, then left. I couldn't decide what to do, so I went back to work.

I didn't move back home until December, and only then because I made do without electricity and gas. I brought in bottled water, an ice chest and set up my propane stove. FEMA had promised me a trailer by the first of November, then by Christmas. By the time I learned a trailer wouldn't fit on my property and I would have to live in a trailer park, I was already back home. I tried to make some sense out of the mess, but mostly I spent time wandering around, commiserating with neighbors. Everything stunk. I didn't know where to start. I was afraid to throw everything away before the insurance adjustor saw it. I wanted to be home, but hated the muck and flies and stench of garbage that wafted out of my refrigerator and throughout the city, filling every pore in my being. I cleaned and cleaned. I wiped everything down with bleach. And I worked.

I went from project to project, interviewing people repairing the levees, demolishing homes, coordinating recovery and repairing the damage. I got hope from these people and continued to work. I fought with my insurance company, fought with FEMA, griped, finally threw out my furniture and stinky fridge and worked. I was lucky to see the progress firsthand when the I-10 Twin Spans were repaired, when mountains of debris were cleared, levees were restored and long-term projects like the Huey P. Long widening and construction of Louisiana Hwy. 1 moved forward.

I saw. I wrote. I clutched at hope.

Then came the conversation with Williams. I was calling contractors throughout the affected area to get their survival/recovery stories. I remembered being angry. Anger was everywhere, it seemed. It was as palpable as the stench in the air. In my frustration, many times I wished my whole house would have washed away. At least then I would know what to do. The codes, the elevations, the slow response from insurance companies, the confusion, the lack of leadership...

I had spent 10 years renovating my home and thought it was time to move on with the next phase of my life. Time to have some fun. Then I remembered how I felt when I had a car stolen years ago. I kept walking around and around, looking in the spot where it should have been. I realized that whatever I was feeling, it couldn't compare with the thousands of people like Williams. He left his home, whatever it was and everything it symbolized for him, and returned the next day to an empty space. The same is true for people in the Lakeview and Lower Ninth Ward neighborhoods of New Orleans, some parts of St. Tammany and much of St. Bernard and Plaquemines parishes. Many people picked their way through piles of indistinguishable rubble, searching for a wedding gown, a favorite toy, a piece of living room furniture—some thing to signify that their lives weren't completely washed away.

When Williams derided me on the phone, the horrible truth was, I couldn't go to Mississippi. I knew I couldn't handle seeing any more. I knew the pain was more than I could bear. The devastation would be too enormous for my mind to absorb. Besides, what could I do?

When the folks at ENR were searching for the appropriate way to address the anniversary of Katrina, I made a few suggestions. I was working on what I thought the project would be when I got a call from Sawyer saying that John Kosowatz was asking how the magazine could get into Mississippi. I knew right where to begin, with Max Williams and Gulf Coast Pre-Stress.

The time was right. I could do something. Each day, on the drive back to New Orleans from Bay St. Louis, Pass Christian, Gulfport or Biloxi, I tried to sort through my feelings. I am continually inspired by the individuals in construction who methodically advance projects and remind the rest of us that there is hope. It can be rebuilt. I am amazed at the fortitude of individuals working to rebuild, even while their homes are lost and they are wearing borrowed shoes. They work, so the rest of us can live.

I read somewhere that we rescue others because, in the rescuing, we save a portion of ourselves. Perhaps work is all they have. Perhaps, in the face of such overwhelming destruction, it's all one man can do. When I faced my flooded house the first time, all I could do was return to work.

During the course of interviewing people in Mississippi, one evening, I found myself consumed with an overwhelming feeling of inadequacy. These stories need to be told, and need to be heard. I've only skimmed the surface of the events occurring in New Orleans, and I've virtually ignored Mississippi. Most of the folks down here feel like the rest of the country has moved on and thinks we're okay. We've had Mardi Gras and Jazz Fest in New Orleans. Some of the casinos have re-opened on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Driving on Interstate 10 through Mississippi, one could easily imagine nothing has ever happened. You don't see the debris everywhere like in New Orleans, mostly because, like Williams' home, it washed away. For me, all it takes is to look in the face of one person, and it's as real as if it happened yesterday. We are surviving, but none of us will ever forget Katrina. We are okay, but it's far from all right.

	Galloway

Who is Really Responsible for Design Coordination?
By Dr. Patricia D. Galloway
August 22, 2006

I increasingly see more and more projects facing multi-million dollar claims as a result of lack of design coordination, primarily in public-works construction. More and more often, the lack of design coordination appears to be the result of the need to get bid documents on the street to meet referendums on the ballot, federal funding requests and/or commitments made with third party utilities in memoranda of understanding. The rush to get the design finalized and out to bid results in a high probability that the design has not been fully coordinated, especially when there are multiple design firms involved.

When things go bad on the project because things "just don't work", who bears the responsibility for the incomplete and/or uncoordinated design? I have seen attempts by owners to include contract clauses attempting to shift the risk to the contractor with the requirement to identify any glaring errors and omissions. Other risk-shifting clauses include the requirement to perform constructability reviews, thus appearing to indicate that if it is not constructable then the contractor is somehow responsible. However, as more and more cases are demonstrating, these clauses cannot protect the owner, in a design-bid-build project, from issuing a complete set of coordinated and accurate plans.

This is the key question: when a set of drawings contains sheets that conflict with each other, or information that may be correct on one sheet in one discipline, but incorrect on another sheet in another discipline depicting the same design, who bears the ultimate responsibility when the design was rushed to bid? Is it the owner or is it the designer? Or is it a combination? It surely is not the contractor's responsibility!

The answer lies in the engineer's role and responsibility under his or her license. The engineer must assure that the design is complete, accurate and constructability--simple as that. If an engineer is aware that there are errors or omissions in the documents, the engineer cannot simply hide behind the guise of limited or depleted funds available to it, or the owner's directive to do so. The engineer must recognize that by stamping a set of drawings, that he or she is telling the contractor that he or she has checked the drawings and to the extent of what is reasonably known or could have been known, that the drawings are complete, accurate and constructable-and thus have been coordinated with the various disciplines. The initial claims will of course be made by the contractor against the owner due to the contract being between the two parties, but ultimately the owner will look to the engineer for whatever final action was taken.

Training sessions offered by the insurance companies providing error and omission coverage provide guidance on these issues. It would be wise for more engineering firms to take advantage of this training and to assure that its engineers who are stamping drawings in their firms are aware of the risks and liabilities that he or she may face (as well as the firm) regardless of what "directives" may have been issued by the owner. A little more prevention may save everyone millions of dollars and litigation time.

Art and Engineering: Leonardo, Where Art Thou?
By Dr. Patricia D. Galloway
August 14, 2006

Art and Engineering-whoever heard of such a thing!! After all, we know that artists think with the left side of their brain and engineers with the right side--or is it the other way around? For centuries, people have thought that artists are technically inclined become Architects. And we all know the battle between architects and engineers! Most people tend to think of engineers as people with lab coats, dark thick glasses and solitary individuals working behind closed doors devising solutions to problems based on math and physics. Architects, on the other hand, portray the beauty in what they do on paper and transform that art into physical buildings hoping for artistic awards. What aren't we getting?

Engineers are just as much artists as architects and have been using their full brains for centuries. The best example of one of the greatest artists and engineers of all times was Leonardo DaVinci. I was watching a PBS special the other night on DaVinci and two plans of his work that never got off the ground in his lifetime (No pun intended). One was a hang-glider and the other was a weapons slingshot for use in battle in lieu of cannons. The story was about how two groups of researchers were able to take his original plans and recreate them using the original intent of Leonardo, and to demonstrate that they indeed worked. Over months of design review and construction, the two inventions were born.

How is it that such a great artist could also create some of the world's greatest engineering inventions long before they were actually put into application? Creativity--it all goes to what we tell our kids about careers and what they do. Somehow we have forgotten that work is "fun" and that the best part of working is creative thought and dreams of inventing new means and methods and/or new inventions of machinery or other objects which make life easier. When one is told to dream and told to transorm the impossible into reality, it removes certain barriers from one's internal mind and allows a more free flowing thought process. This thought process can actually result in greater efficiency if one is able to "think out of the box" and recognize that it does not always have to be done the same way it has been done for 100 years.

We have examples of engineers who are just as much artists today as Leonardo was then. Look at some of the greatest bridges around the world--the Tsing Ma in Hong Kong, The Brooklyn Bridge in NYC or the Fred Hartman Bridge in Baytown, Texas, near Houston--all designed by structural engineers and examples of art and beauty that the public admires. Having just attended my first National Science Board meeting, I was able to see scientific engineering projects being built around the world that look more like "art" than research. Nanotechnology produces some of the most magnificent forms of molecular art that anyone has ever seen. When the new NSF Strategic Plan is released in September, I urge my readers to look at the cover and to guess what it is. I guarantee you are in for a surprise.

Manufacturer's Warranties: Just Another Pipe Dream?
By Dr. Patricia D. Galloway
August 4, 2006

Recently, I have been researching the difference between the use of High Density Polyethylene (HDPE) plastic pipe versus Reinforced Concrete Pipe (RCP) for drainage and sewer work. In interviewing several engineers who design pipe, as well as contractors who install pipe, I asked them what they believed the difference to be. The answer: it is merely a material substitution. The primary reason in specifying HDPE pipe over RCP pipe appears to be primarily cost and ease of installation. Some also indicated that they relied on the manufacturers’ warranties in their decisions. Benefits claimed life expectancies of between 50-100 years. If the manufacturer says it is true-it must be so. But is it?

The answers seemed too easy. I began to investigate what the manufacturer’s warranties actually said. True to form, what some of the engineers told me was indeed true. Manufacturers, as well as the Plastics • Pipe • Institute have made claims that HDPE pipe is lighter, easier to install and in the end-results in thousands of dollars of savings. (Note that the fine print, however, disavows any responsibility if anything goes wrong). Thus, with such great assertions, why go anywhere else?

The answers however, seemed too easy and simple. Further research indicated significant failures in HDPE pipe resulting in significant monetary damages from both property losses as well as life in some cases. Failures in some states have resulted in some DOTs digging out and replacing pipe and several indicated they had now banned its use. Seemed a little extreme to me as well. Thus, more research.

What I discovered was that HDPE plastic pipe is simply NOT a material substitution. While RCP is a rigid structure and does not depend on the surrounding soils to support it, HDPE pipe is merely a material which requires the soil envelope around the pipe to act as part of the actual design. Thus, the drainage (or sewer) system is not truly designed until the pipe is actually placed in the field, requiring the Engineer to oversee the installation as the Engineer of record takes full responsibility for the pipe design.

Does this mean that HDPE pipe cannot be used at all? Absolutely not! However, what it does mean is that the engineer has the responsibility to review the criteria set forth by the Client and to fully evaluate whether HDPE pipe is the most suitable alterative for a project. Further, the engineer must assure that it has fully designed the pipe in consideration of the soil envelope around it. Merely accepting the manufacturer’s assertions as shown on the packaging will not exonerate the engineer nor relieve the engineer of its full responsibility to assure the health, safety and welfare of the public. When the pipe fails, it will not simply be the contractor on the hook for recovery. The engineer could also be liable. Is it worth the risk of losing one’s license or the cost of fighting a lawsuit? Engineers need to understand the risks and liabilities before proceeding with any design and to recognize the appropriate standard of care. Nothing, including warranties, will ever substitute for hard work.