A FELLOWSHIP AWARDED

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21247, 20 August 1934, Page 13

A FELLOWSHIP AWARDED

PUBLIC WORKS ENGINEER HONOURED EARTHQUAKE-RESISTING CONSTRUCTION A Commonwealth Service Fellow* ship has been awarded to Mr C. W. Turner, assistant designing engineer in the Public Works Department. Ha will leave for California shortly to take up the fellowship. Mr Turner, who is a graduate of tha University of London, took his degrees with honours in structural engineer-. ing. Since joining the Pubic Workf Department in 1926 he has been en* gaged considerably on carthquakc-r** sistant design ior buildings, bridges, and other works. After the Hawke'a Bay earthquake of 1931, Mr Tunic*

MR C. W. TURNER. wns appointed to give technical advice to the affected, boroughs regarding damaged structures, and Inter thai most plans tor reconstruction o£ build" in.gs parsed through his hands. Modem Methods Having been awarded a Common."' wonlUi Fellowship, he proposes to enquire thoroughly into the latest method.'; being followed in the United Stales for the design of structures, particularly for Ihe carthquake-resist-ing types. In tho past, involved mathenviics lias rendered close imalysis of building frames impracticable, and engineers have designed the structures as a series of separate parts, the beams carrying th'a floors, the nilIprs carrying the beams, and Ihe foundations carrying the pillars, but to-day the tendency is to provide for monolithic construction as the most economic solution of the earthoutfke problem, and involved mathematics a gradually being simplified. At Stanford Universiiy. where Mr Tui-ner will beam his investigation!?, a largo shaking-table is available -vhich can be made to simulate the corrmlex motions of an earthemnke. and thus scale model:; of structures can ba tested for eartlxniakc ("distance, on* ablins the indications of theory to ba tested in practice. A full knowlcdga of this work and of progress gcnerr>lJv in California, where considerable earthquake investigation work is be* ing done, will be of considerable value to the Dominion. Apart from Ihe earthauake v/orlc, Mr Turner proooses to er.auire into modern American design, and the eon* struction of general engineering struct tures. particularly bridges and otheff similar public works. Turnosc of B«rfofact'nn The Commonwealth Fellowship* were created by the directors of tha Commonwealth Fund of New York, a philanthropic foundation supported by gifts from the late Mrs Stephen V. Harkness, a primary object being thai of promoting mutual amity and under, standing between the British Empire and the United States. These fellow-, ships are the American counterpart of the Rhodes Scholarships. In recent years, the Commonwealth Service Fellowships have been created, which ore open to officers of British Governments, who put forward a scheme cj work relating to a problem which is exercising the Government under which the applicant is serving. Two or three fellowships aro awarded annually, and New Zealand has been singularly fortunate in the past, previous holders of fellowships being Dr. K. A. Campbell, who is a member of the secretarial stuff of tha Minister for Finance, Mr Gordon Beck, irrigation engineer. Public Works Department, and Dr. Focken, of the University of Otago.