UAF to compete at national steel bridge contest

May 24, 2016

A team of students from the University of Alaska Fairbanks will compete at a national bridge-building contest on May 27-28 at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah.

UAF photo by JR Ancheta. Catherine Estus adds the finishing touches to a steel bridge model during a practice run in the Duckering Building. The UAF Steel Bridge Team will compete at nationals on May 27-28 at Brigham Young University.

The American Society of Civil Engineers hosts the ASCE Steel Bridge Competition each year as a test of skill and knowledge for engineering students. The 10-member UAF Steel Bridge Team earned the right to compete at nationals in early April after winning the Pacific Northwest regional competition at the University of Idaho.

The competition challenges students to develop a strong and efficient bridge design, judging it on criteria that include stiffness, weight and construction speed. The guidelines for the bridges change each year, requiring teams to develop new designs for each competition.

“Everything factors into our overall score,” said team captain Elliott Anderson, a junior civil engineering student. “It’s a balancing act of trying to do these things that all oppose each other.”

Anderson said UAF’s team has worked since September to plan and build its bridge. Since regionals, the team has worked to increase its speed, cutting its construction time roughly in half to about 8 minutes.

Along with Anderson, the team includes Catherine Estus, Wilhelm Muench, Nick Marcello, Scott Taylor, Ryan Burnham, Nathan Barnett, Shane Ohms, Danny Smith and Mayra Cedeno. UAF engineering professor Leroy Hulsey serves as advisor to the team.

It’s the second consecutive trip to nationals for the UAF team, which finished in ninth place last year. UAF won the national competition in 1993.