Building the Ravenel Bridge


After all the photos I took, I've tried to arrange them in some order based on various topics I found interesting.

And a reminder from T.S. Eliot (East Coker from the Four Quartets) 

Old men ought to be explorers
Here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion
Home East Bay Ramp Last Shark Fin Closing Main Span Gap Main Span Paving Building a cable Erecting a pipe Last Stay Cable Opening Events Engineering Insights Stories of Bridge Folks Erecting Steel High Steel Staging workflow First site visit Loading The Traveler Freyssinet Birthday Bridge Art Bridge Blog Unbuilding the Grace and Pearman Bridges About me Photo_Essays
Wade Watson - a man with a mission

May 22, 2005:
Finally I have a photo of Wade, the superintent of the bridge replacement project - the man where the buck stops.

For me, this is a story of how the Internet breaks down hierarchical barriers and brings folks together who typically would not cross paths. Wade, Peo, Marvin Tallent, Derek, Bill Mankin (High Steel Structures), Oliver Forget and Andre Coudret (Freyssinet) and David Wertz (SCDOT) somehow stumbled on my bridge web pages and offered to discuss their projects. In addition, these folks provided encouragement, opened seemingly impossible doors and shared their insights with me. Without them (and many many others), these pages would not exist. To the right is Murray Feldman, deep in a discussion about the elevator brake shoes. Always another problem to solve.

Bridge design, engineering and construction are examples of continuous problem solving, similar in many ways to problem solving in my research investigations of reentrant cardiac arrhythmias and antiarrhythmic drugs. I was surprised by the parallels between the bridge work and lab work.

Here is Wade, enjoying a carefree ride on his bridge - what a great way to unwind.

July 17, 2005: Its all over except the shouting
Wade and Wade with his mom

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C. Frank Starmer

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