For those of you looking for interesting teaching opportunities in recent engineering failures (and with the new academic year starting, this may be on your mind), a good area to consider are reports of failure in aging infrastructure. Bridges, gas pipelines, electrical transmission systems — examples (unfortunately) abound, and can often be found in your local area. In fact, I occassionally conduct an “un-nature walk” with my students during which I point out not only how engineers design buildings, roads, street lights, etc., but also how infrastructure fails. From cracked sidewalks to rust from rebar coming through walls, examples are everywhere.

An interesting example, with teaching potential, in my neck of the woods, is the recent failure (due to a fire in a century-old switch room) of the Long Island Railroad’s venerable Jamaica hub. The New York Times has covered this nicely (see http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/24/nyregion/24lirr.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=long%20island%20transit&st=cse for example), and there is plenty of additional information available. Of course, a major problem with replacing aging infrastructure is cost, which presents a difficulty for engineers and politicians alike. Where, and what, do you repair or replace first? How do you create an effective maintenance plan, taking into account constraints in time, labor, money, etc.? Hopefully, we won’t always have to wait for a failure (or a disaster in terms of lives or costs) to provide guidance.

Good luck in the new academic year, and please write back with your thoughts on learning from disaster!