The UNM student chapter of the American Society for Civil Engineers (ASCE) will display a steel bridge that recently won second place in a regional competition. The bridge will be on display on the SUB mall, Friday, April 29 from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Photo: Civil Engineering Steel Bridge team members Chris Grgich and Chris Johnson.
A UNM team took fifth place overall, competing against 12 other schools at the ASCE Rocky Mountain Regional Conference in Salt Lake City. This was the second year that UNM entered the competition. Students participated in four of six categories: steel bridge, technical paper, pre-design, and mystery design. The steel bridge, which won second place in its category, ranked first in the weight division and second in aesthetics.
UNM’s Sarah Shannon, a native of Aztec, N.M., won first place for her technical paper on evaporation in soil. The mystery design team also won first and Tandy Freel and Carlos Segura tied for third in the pre-design competition
Shannon is happy with the competition’s outcome. “We’re competing against really big schools that have huge civil engineering departments. This year we’re graduating 12 seniors, so it’s really amazing for us to do so well in the competition,” she said.
Shannon hopes to work as an environmental engineer when she graduates. As a civil engineering student, she spent last summer conducting research at the Rio Grande River on evaporation through the soil. She used her research to write a 3,000-word paper that she presented to the judges at the competition.
“We’re very proud of Sarah”, said Tim J. Ward, chairman of Civil Engineering.
UNM’s steel bridge team will travel to Orlando, Fla. on May 28 for the AISC National Student Steel Bridge Competition where they will compete against 30 other colleges and universities. “We have almost no money, and it’s expensive to send everyone out to nationals,” said Shannon.
People interested in sponsoring the team should contact Walter Gerstle at 277-3458.
Contact: Greg Johnston, 277-1816
Posted by scarr at April 28, 2005 10:19 AM