122

CBC: Sask. engineer slapped with an 18-month suspension after designing bridge that collapsed hours after opening (www.cbc.ca)

submitted 1 year ago by TheTango@lemmy.world to c/world@lemmy.world

23 comments fedilink hide all child comments

top 23 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[-] LastYearsPumpkin@feddit.ch 32 points 1 year ago

He improperly designed five bridges, this is just the one that collapsed, starting the investigation.

Now he's prohibited from working on bridge projects for 5 years. I think that's prudent, he could have easily killed people.

Wondering if this was just due to negligence, or if there were other systemic issues that allowed or encouraged these design problems, like pressure from management, or improper reviews. Feels like a pretty big failure to not have this work checked by at least one other engineer.

[-] ijeff@lemdro.id 15 points 1 year ago

I do wonder if even 5 years is enough if there's a pattern.

[-] teft@startrek.website 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Right? I wouldn't want this guy building anything load bearing.

[-] JohnnyCanuck@lemmy.ca 12 points 1 year ago

Wondering if this was just due to negligence, or if there were other systemic issues that...

I find it funny that nobody (including the article) is discussing the chance that it's straight up incompetence.

Feels like a pretty big failure to not have this work checked by at least one other engineer.

Yeah, this is a very good point too. Where's the peer review on something that is so critical!?

[-] gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 year ago

In a 5Ys/RCA process, I always make it a point to focus on process failures pretty much exclusively… except when there’s malfeasance, negligence, or outright incompetence involved. This situation seems like one of those exceptional instances.

But there were clearly some process failures as well.

[-] HubertManne@kbin.social 8 points 1 year ago

!remind in 5 years. don't cross new canadian bridges.

[-] can@sh.itjust.works 1 points 1 year ago

@remindme@mstdn.social 5 years.

[-] JoBo@feddit.uk 7 points 1 year ago

The client told him to cut corners. He acted unprofessionally by not refusing to do so. From an earlier report:

In response to the lawsuit, Gullacher and his companies agreed that they hadn't done a geotechnical investigation, but insisted that was at the client's request.

"The RM provided the instruction that no geotechnical investigation should be obtained as the RM was concerned about the additional cost and delay," says Gullacher and Inertia's statement of defence.

"Inertia admits that a portion of the bridge collapsed," the statement says, "but denies that its design or specifications caused the collapse and puts the plaintiff to strict proof thereof."

Inertia says the RM may bear some blame because it decided to forgo the geotechnical work. It also says that after the bridge was built, the RM "installed gravel on the bridge to a depth of 13 to 16 inches with an average depth of 14 inches, which far exceeded the specified load."

Both parties share responsibility here. He's incompetent and unethical and should not be allowed to continue to practice at all. The relevant professional bodies need to issue clear instructions, and strike off any practitioner that just shrugs and does what the client wants. (Yes, it is a problem in my entirely different field too.)

[-] galmuth@feddit.uk 6 points 1 year ago

the RM "installed gravel on the bridge to a depth of 13 to 16 inches with an average depth of 14 inches, which far exceeded the specified load."

WTF, why the hell would they go and dump 16 inches of gravel on the bridge? That's an awful lot of weight.

Clearly this guy couldn't have stopped them dumping gravel after the bridge was completed, but allowing the client to save money on critical safety measures is inexcusable.

[-] Shadow@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 year ago

There's mention at the end that he lost his company. If he was just a one person consulting gig, that might explain the lack of peer review.

[-] islandmonkeee@kbin.social 25 points 1 year ago

Why would you suspend a bridge engineer?

To see if the bridge works.

☠️☠️

[-] xuxebiko@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago

LMAO!

[-] skarn@feddit.ch 16 points 1 year ago

Guess it was a suspension bridge

[-] Apetitenevermind@lemmy.ca 4 points 1 year ago

slow clap

[-] UFODivebomb@programming.dev 15 points 1 year ago

"It opened and collapsed on Sept. 14, 2018. " ouch

[-] Squorlple@lemmy.world 13 points 1 year ago

Ironic. He could save bridges from suspension but not himself.

[-] autotldr@lemmings.world 10 points 1 year ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:

The association that regulates professional engineers in Saskatchewan has suspended Scott Gullacher for 18 months because he designed a bridge that collapsed just hours after it opened to the public.

Gullacher was responsible for the Dyck Memorial Bridge in the RM of Clayton, about 300 kilometres east of Saskatoon.

On Monday, the association released its final order related to its investigation into Gullacher's misconduct, including the bridge collapse — described in the document as a "catastrophic failure" — and other projects.

The association determined that Gullacher didn't operate in a "careful and diligent manner" on the Dyck Memorial Bridge, because he did not employ a site-specific geotechnical analysis and did not provide adequate engineering designs for the helical pile foundations.

The start of Gullacher's suspension is backdated to June 8, 2022 — the date he was ordered to stop practicing professionally in the province.

During the investigation process, Gullacher testified that he paid $250,000 out of his own pocket to repair the collapsed Dyck Memorial Bridge, according to the association.

I'm a bot and I'm open source!

[-] obinice@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago

Good that this chap is suspended and probably blacklisted by now, but let's not forget that structures like this aren't simply designed by a single person and then put into production.

Other engineers will have checked the designs thoroughly to find errors and issues. Whomever signed off on his work should also be closely scrutinised.

If it turns out he someone got his designs built with no oversight, then I would say the issue runs much deeper. Is it incompetence on the part of the company? Or does it go further. How many other companies may also be slipping through the cracks with improperly tested structures, etc.

[-] themeatbridge@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago

I worked for a structural engineering firm, and you're going to be disappointed about the dilligence and competence of oversight. It's projects like these that result in additional reviews and investigations, but civil engineering is one of those things that governments stop funding when it's working well.

Everyone forgets why they need inspectors and regulators and qualified reviews documented in triplicate. Businesses need to grow, after all, and these derned taxes and red tape are just gumming up the works. So everyone relaxes to the point where one overworked moron is responsible for the safety and structural integrity of six bridges in a remote part of Canada, and then one of them falls down.

In this case, they spent under $400k to build a bridge, and the engineer didn't even do a geotechnical survey for the helical piles. He also failed to provide welding details, but the eyewitness reports say that it looked like the ground under the piles gave way from below, which wouldn't be caused by imsufficient welds.

[-] Mr_Blott@feddit.uk 7 points 1 year ago

What on earth is a sask engineer?

[-] hoch@lemmy.world 20 points 1 year ago

An engineer from Saskatchewan

[-] Mr_Blott@feddit.uk 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

So if I said an Aucht engineer you'd know he was from Auchtermuchty? 😂

[-] can@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 year ago

CBC is Canadian and anyone here would know its Saskatchewan.

Unless of course it was Saskatoon

this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023

122 points (99.2% liked)

World News

38563 readers

3235 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
- Post news articles only
- Video links are NOT articles and will be removed.
- Title must match the article headline
- Not United States Internal News
- Recent (Past 30 Days)
- Screenshots/links to other social media sites (Twitter/X/Facebook/Youtube/reddit, etc.) are explicitly forbidden, as are link shorteners.
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed. Sources that have a Low or Very Low factual reporting rating or MBFC Credibility Rating may be removed.
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF 10/19
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

Lemmy World Partners

News !news@lemmy.world

Politics !politics@lemmy.world

World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world

Recommendations

How to spot Misinformation and Propaganda

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

Consider including the article’s mediabiasfactcheck.com/ link

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

quinten@lemmy.world

NewsAutoMod@lemmy.world

jordanlund@lemmy.world

Tenthrow@lemmy.world

little_cow@lemmy.world

lemmyAtom@lemmy.world

FlyingSquid@lemmy.world