• Question: what is an engineer?

    Asked by shane1999 to Ruth on 16 Jun 2014.
    • Photo: Ruth Gregory

      Ruth Gregory answered on 16 Jun 2014:

      Within Infrastructure or Civil Engineering, an engineer is the person who designs and makes decisions on what goes where and what materials are used.

      There are two main types of engineers in my field:

      1) Design Engineer – The person who carries out calculations using the material properties and ensures a structure/building can carry the correct load. They put this information on a drawing and have meetings to pass the infromation to the on-site team. They set out what methods are used and whether the designs will affect the surrounding environment.
      2) Site Engineer – The person who uses the drawings and information from the engineer to build/construct the planned structure/building. They will be the person talking to the designer throughout construction to discuss any problems and queries with the design. They generally control the quality of the materials and workmanship.

      Both of these roles require a lot of attention to detail and you make a lot of big decisions which is a lot of responsibility but you do have great teams around you in both roles to help you make the right decisions.

    • Photo: anon

      anon answered on 16 Jun 2014:

      To understand what civil engineers do, you need to think about what you do in the first hour after you wake up on a Monday morning.

      You clean your teeth using the running water in your bathroom. Have a cup of tea or coffee. You travel to work on a finely constructed network of roads or on a train or underground system. You park your car or grab another cup of coffee at the train station before heading to the office. You might even walk through an underpass or over a bridge before finally settling at your desk. None of this would have been possible without civil engineers.

      Civil engineers design and build bridges, roads, railways, and tunnels. They design and build tall structures and large buildings such as multi-storey car parks, train stations, and even the Olympic stadium.

      Without civil engineers we wouldn’t have a constant supply of clean water, or sustainable energy to help us save our planet. Without civil engineers the world we live in would be completely unrecognisable.

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