Building bridge to their futures

One bridge resembled a type that’s prevalent in Australia.

By SEAN BARRON

VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT

YOUNGSTOWN — When it comes to building bridges, Kayla Neuberger, Victoria Climo and Kayla Ohlin have carved out numerous careful and thorough connections.

“We put a hole in the middle with as much material [near it] as we can to compensate for the hole, which is the weakest part,” Kayla Ohlin explained, referring to the truss-style bridge the three Springfield High School juniors assembled.

“Our physics teacher inspired us,” added Victoria, as she used a blow dryer to dry glue.

Around 10 teams from Springfield competed in a similar school event, and theirs was one of two top-finishing teams, Victoria Climo and Kayla Neuberger said.

The three made their bridge from balsa wood and were on one of 12 teams from area high schools to build a structure with that material while competing in Friday’s first Mahoning Valley Miniature Bridge Building Competition at Youngstown State University’s Kilcawley Center.

Participating were students and their advisers from Canfield, Chaney, Lowellville, Springfield and Western Reserve high schools, as well as Choffin Career Center and the Mahoning County Career & Technical Center.

The event, sponsored in part by YSU, Boardman Hobby Center Inc. and MS Consultants Inc. of Youngstown, was to promote awareness of civil engineering as a career and to provide students with educational opportunities to use their knowledge related to real-world engineering applications, organizers said.

Along those lines, Susan Dunn, a Springfield physics teacher who also served as the girls’ adviser, pointed out that the competition fits well with her curriculum and gives the students hands-on ways to further appreciate load distribution, force of gravity and other physics concepts.

At another table, Billy Heckathorn, Kenny Hickman and Adam Shoulders, all of Chaney, busily put together an arch-type structure based loosely on a style common in Australia.

Billy and Adam, a sophomore and junior, respectively, said they were considering engineering as a career.

“It’s not very fancy, but we worked on it a week or two,” Billy added.

The three created the design on a computer, then made a model at school that served as a prototype for the one they built at the competition, Adam explained.

Also gravitating toward the arch style were Lowellville seniors Joe Arthur, Dom Moore and John Lyras. Their bridge featured a single rail with support angles to help the span’s weight be evenly distributed, they noted.

After constructing their projects, students’ had their bridges inspected for adherence to design specifications, length and width, then load-tested until the structures failed, noted Larry Webster of MS Consultants.

Selection of the top-finishing projects was based on the most efficient load-carrying capacity-to-structure weight ratio, as well as meeting design and other criteria.

One bridge won an award for its aesthetics, based mainly on how pleasing and well-built it was, Webster added.

Also organizing the competition was Mahoning County Engineer Richard Marsico. Tom Metts of the Boardman Hobby Center contributed materials.