Over 200 buildings will receive some form of geotechnical and geostructural monitoring around the Highway 99 tunnel in Seattle, better known as the tunnel that will replace the Alaskan Way Viaduct. A Seattle Times article listed some of the technologies being employed, such as automated survey machines, crack meters, extensometers, tiltmeters, liquid level sensors, inclinometers and crack gauges. A total of roughly 700 devices will be deployed by the time the tunneling starts this summer, a $20 million program. The project team will also be using interferrometric synthetic aperture radar or INSAR techniques to supplement the traditional surveying methods as they watch for subsidence and ground loss problems along the tunnel route. This satellite-based method is accurate up to 1/8 inch, but has the advantage of being able to cover a larger area than just using the survey prisms at particular points. [Source: The Seattle Times via ASCE SmartBrief. Image: KEN LAMBERT / THE SEATTLE TIMES]

Did that headline catch your eye too? Here are a few interesting links I didn't get to blogging about...including that little gem from Norway.  Be careful if you are doing fondue for V-Day!

• Shaner Industries’ Steel Foundation Supports A 90-foot Tall Wind Turbine - Source: Shaner Industries
• 2013 Tunneling Industry Forecast - Source: Tunnel Business Magazine
• EarthSoft Receives 2012 Environmental Business Journal Business Achievement Award for Growth & Innovation - Source: LinkedIn
• Will This Giant Glass Skirt By Pierre Cardin Be Venice’s First Skyscraper? - Source: Architizer Blog via ASCE SmartBrief
• SBMA Design - Source: hetGE
• Landslide blamed on 'river of fat' leaves dozens of homes at risk - Source: Telegraph
• New DFI President Bittner Talks About Group’s Future - Source: National Driller
• Caldecott Tunnel's new bore is down to the finishing touches - Source: ContraCostaTimes.com via ASCE SmartBrief
• Green Options May Delay Water Tunnel Construction - Source: The Hoya
• 7 years after Katrina, inspectors finding dangerous deficiencies in US levees - Source: The Washington Post via ASCE SmartBrief
• Ivanpah transmission construction - difficult access - Source: Crux Subsurface
• Geological Society of America Celebrates 125 Years - Source: GSA
• Flaming cheese shuts down road tunnel in northern Norway - Source: The Washington Post
• Tensar announces geogrid price increase - Source: Geosynthetics Magazine
• U.S. Rep. Tom Price visits Tensar headquarters - Source: Geosynthetics

I stumbled across this great answer to that question from Geotechnical consulting firm Tierra Group International, LTD a geotechnical consulting firm servicing the mining industry:

Mankind lives on the earth. Everything built, either originated from, is built on, or interacts with, the earth. Geology is the science of the earth. Geotechnical Engineering is the application of geology and mathematics to use Earth's natural resources to build infrastructure.

It reminds me of one of my favorite geo-engineering quotes from Richard L. Handy:

Virtually every structure is supported by soil or rock. Those that aren't either fly, float, or fall over.

[Source: Tierra Group International, Ltd.. Image: Tierra Group International, Ltd.]

Becker Penetration Test (BPT) is a field test used for estimation of relative density of coarse-grained material containing cobbles and boulders. NovoBPT is designed for correcting raw BPT blow counts (N_b) and correlating them to SPT blow counts (N₆₀). Click the link below to download a brochure on the new product from Geotechnical Software Company and GeoPrac sponsor Novotech! [Source: Novotech (click for their brochure). Image: Great West Drilling]

The New York MTA is in the midst of a “golden era” of tunneling for the New York subway.  Three separate mega-projects are currently underway totaling some $15 Billion:  The Second Avenue Subway, The East Side Access Project (which features the new Grand Central Terminal), and The Number 7 Subway Line Extension Project.  The short video below was published by the NY Post and included in an AP Article.  It is tantalizingly short, but gives a great perspective on what the underground construction project at Grand Central looks like and a sense of the scale…the amazing huge caverns being constructed. The article says that from underneath Grand Central Terminal alone, the construction crews have removed enough material to cover Central Park almost a foot deep!

[Source: KOMO News (Seattle) via ASCE SmartBrief. Image: AP Photo/Mary Altaffer via KOMOnews.com]

Click through for the video.

Hawthorne, NJ (December 27, 2012): The Deep Foundations Institute (DFI) announces a call for entries for its major 2013 awards. Submissions for the 2013 Awards are due by April 15, 2013. Guidelines and nomination forms are available at www.dfi.org/about.asp. The first three awards are presented at DFI’s Annual Conference on Deep Foundations, this year in Phoenix, AZ, on September 27.

[Editor] Read on for the full list of awards from the DFI. [/Editor]

PITTSBURGH, PA – February 5, 2013 – Nicholson Construction was recently awarded the geotechnical work for the new Children’s Pavilion at Children’s Hospital of Richmond at the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) by Skanska Building, USA.

The $168 million, 640,000 square-foot facility will house 72 exam rooms, a surgical area with two operating rooms, and two procedure rooms, areas for diagnostic testing, imaging and laboratory services. Construction also includes an attached parking garage with more than 600 spaces.

The new Children’s Pavilion will make Children’s Hospital of Richmond the largest and most advanced outpatient facility dedicated to children in the region.

[Editor] Read the rest of the press release from GeoPrac.net sponsor Nicholson Construction. [/Editor]

Strah Antoljak, a Bentley Product Manager, posted in the gINT Linked In Group that Bentley has launched a new geotechnical website showcasing their two main geotechnical software products - gINT and GeoStructural Analysis (GSA). Make sure you check out the new site from GeoPrac sponsor Bentley. And while you are at it, join Strah's gINT Linkedin Group. [Source: LinkedIn gINT Group. Image: Bentley]

A thief stole a taxi at knife point in Brookings, Oregon recently, and then tried to escape when a police officer attempted to pull him over in the stolen vehicle. He ignored signs of a road closed due to a landslide, but quickly found out that the signs were no joke as his car collided with the mud, rock and debris from the landslide blocking the road. He was taken into custody without further incident. [Source: KOMO News. Image: komonews.com]

New York's famous transportation icon, Grand Central Station (more properly Grand Central Terminal) celebrated the 100th anniversary of it's opening on February 2, 2013.  This rail terminal is more than just a means of travelling from point A to B, but it is a romantic, and grandiose metaphor for the hustle and bustle of American life.  While the structure is definitely a cultural and architectural monument, it is also an engineering marvel, a fact recognized in 2012 by ASCE when it named it a National Civil Engineering Historic Landmark.

While the centennial of the GCT is being celebrated, a new project is taking shape approximately 90 feet below the existing tracks.  The East Side Access project (ESA) will provide a new connection from the Long Island Rail Road (LIRR) to GCT.  This project will help...

[Editor] Click through for the rest of this article, including a list of some interesting websites on Grand Central Terminal and the East Side Access Project. [/Editor]

Via @davely on Twitter.

A municipal solid waste slide occurred several days ago in an environmentally sensitive area of Greece, near the National Water Park of Zakynthos, the main habitat of a protected sea turtle. The slide covered a structure where equipment for the gas collection system was housed. More info at Geoengineer.org. [Source: Geoengineer.org. Image: Geoengineer.org]