FEATURED ARTICLES BY BILL O'DONNELL

4/5/2013· Engineering

Case Study: Coke Oven Battery Analysis

By: Bill O'Donnell

A comprehensive engineering analysis was performed on a coke oven battery roof and heating walls. Coke oven batteries are constructed with refractory bricks.

2/14/2014· Accident Investigation & Reconstruction

Automated Retrieval System Failure Results in Catastrophic Fire at Storage Facility

By: Bill O'Donnell

The largest storage rack/ retrieval system, larger than two football fields and eighty feet wide was constructed to store 108 million pounds of paper products. On July, 2002, after two months of use, the facility collapsed and sparked a fire that destroyed the entire structure and 45 million pounds of paper. Nearly 50 fire departments responded to the inferno, which burned for three weeks. The owner of the facility sued a number of companies that included the contractor that designed and built the structure, a subcontractor, and the company that supplied the 110 foot steel columns.