NMSU Students Help Build Bridge For Nicaraguan Communities

NMSU’s Engineers Without Borders student group helped build a nearly 200-foot pedestrian suspension bridge in May in the small Nicaraguan community of Hondura Azul.

The group teamed up with the international nongovernmental organization Bridges to Prosperity to build the bridge, which will provide access to schools, medical care, food and other supplies to about 600 people in three villages when the water level of the local river rises during the rainy season.

Eighteen NMSU students and two faculty advisers went to Hondura Azul, which is located about 120 miles north of Managua in county of Condega . The group included team leaders Jared Martinez, 2010-11 Engineers Without Borders president, and Salvador Hernandez, current vice president, and Kenny Stevens, one of the group’s two faculty advisers and an associate professor of the Department of Engineering Technology and Surveying Engineering. All three had been there in January to meet with BTP representative Milosz Reterski and Osmin Casco, the county engineer of the Municipio de Condega, to assess the lay of the land, including doing a topographic survey of the bridge site and pricing out construction costs.

The locals had dug and poured the foundations for the towers, brought in a significant portion of the remaining materials for the towers, cleared vegetation and collected the necessary tools ahead of the group’s arrival. The groups worked long days — in sometimes very muddy conditions — before finishing the support towers with the help of local masons. For a full week, the groups installed the two anchors for the cables, hanging the cables, attaching rebar for support and stability, adding the cross beams and, finally, laying the planking.

“Nothing was easy — and it’s a very substantial bridge. It’s a pedestrian bridge, but it’s also for the cows and for the horses and carts.” said Sonya Cooper, an engineering professor who participated in the first half of the project. “The team leaders were amazing and all of the students were amazing. They just rocked. They busted their you-know-whats and they got the bridge done. And the whole time there were on-the-ground engineering decisions that had to be made.

Hernandez said the the project was a great opportunity for him and his colleagues to implement their engineering skills. “It’s always a lot different applying what you learned during the class to what the actual application is. So I think that was a great deal for me as a student.”

Before the group’s departure, Juan Zelaya Talavera, a village leader, and Osmin Casco, the county engineer, walked the bridge and the town held an inauguration ceremony. They even brought in an electric generator so they could play recorded music for dancing. According to Stevens, the community had first requested such a bridge from the Nicaraguan government more than 50 years ago, so a celebration was definitely in order.

For more information on the Engineers Without Borders student group and this project click here.

Information from Jay Rodman, 575-646-1996, jrodman@nmsu.edu