*Last week Miami suffered a devastating blow as a pedestrian bridge on Florida International University (FIU) collapsed, killing six people and injuring at least nine others.
The 950-ton prefabricated bridge spanned 175-feet, and was still under construction at the busy eight-lane street where it was reportedly placed using accelerated construction techniques developed by FIU.
It had passed a stress test just hours before the collapse last Thursday; crushing cars underneath that waiting for the red light to change.
The South Miami-based firm that designed the ill-fated bridge is getting a lot of heat — probably even more so because it is led by and consists of all women.
But aside from that, and this is truly amazing, Munilla Construction Management (MCM), a Cuban-American, family-owned company founded in 1983 had been sued for faulty work before.
In fact, last March a construction worker who was severely injured when MCM?s ?makeshift bridge? at Miami?s International Airport collapsed sued them.
You do the math. That’s TWO bridges built by this team that has collapsed.
According to Politico.com, MCM is known to be at the high echelon of the politically connected. Damn! So in spite of a track record that leaves a lot to be desired — and gender and culture aside; its the quality of the work you’ve got to consider here — the firm was still awarded a 14.2 million dollar contract to build the bridge; which, by the way, was inspired by the death of an 18-year-old student who had been struck by a car last year.
The bridge was supposed to connect FIU University to Miami?s Sweetwater neighborhood, so that students would not have to cross using the busy intersection below.
MCM, led by Leonor Flores, an FIU alumna and the executive director of the firm, partnered with the FIGG Bridge Group, a Tallahassee-Based engineering firm, to move the massive foot bridge into place over 8th Street in just 7 hours on Saturday, March 10.
?It is exactly the opposite of what we had intended, and we want to express our deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of those who have been affected,? FIU President Mark Rosenberg said.
Reports say just prior to the bridge collapsing, Flores and her team of female engineers and designers had been praised on social media.
But here’s where the gender-war begins as reports claim critics say simple mathematics would have prevented the disaster in Miami.
According to these “critics,” studies all over the world have shown that boys and men are twice as good at math as girls and women. The gender disparity in mathematics scores explains why there are far fewer women engineers than men in the world.
