Engineers

Albert C. Reymann, a retired Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory mechanical engineer who led a team that helped create the forerunner of the global navigation and positioning systems in use today, died Monday of heart disease at Gilchrist Center Howard County. The longtime Catonsville resident was 85. Born in Baltimore and raised on Homestead Street near Clifton Park, he was the son of Hildebert Reymann, a Revere Copper and Brass supervisor, and Helen Reymann, a homemaker.

John S. "Bud" Linz, a retired engineer and World War II veteran, died Wednesday of pneumonia at Greater Baltimore Medical Center. He was 90. The son of a grocer and a homemaker, John Sebastian Linz was born in Baltimore and raised in Highlandtown. After graduating in 1941 from Mount St. Joseph High School in Irvington, he began studies at the Johns Hopkins University. Mr. Linz left Hopkins to enlist in the Army and served with the 99th Infantry Division in Europe. He fought at the Battle of the Bulge, where he was wounded and earned a Purple Heart.

The delicate craft was airborne for just 4.2 seconds, but it was enough to earn engineering students at the University of Maryland's Clark School of Engineering two world records for human-powered helicopter flight. The National Aeronautic Association, which observed the flight, has certified that UM biology student and bicycle racer Judy Wexler pedaled the four-rotor Gamera into the air on May 12 in a gym at the Comcast Center. It was the final attempt in two days of tests. The NAA said the brief flight established the U.S. national duration records for both human-powered helicopter flight, and for human-powered helicopter flight by a female pilot.

Nearly one in four jobs in the Baltimore area requires skills in science, technology, engineering and math, a concentration that ranks among the top 10 in the country and brings wealth to the region, according a report released Monday. The Baltimore area ranks No. 8 on a list of metropolitan areas with the highest percentage of jobs requiring high-level knowledge in STEM, the acronym by which the fields are known. The nearly 282,000 STEM jobs in the region in 2011 made up 23.1 percent of all jobs, according to the Brookings Institution report, "The Hidden Stem Economy.

Tracy Marcotte scanned a hand-held metal detector across various spots on the base of the Washington Monument as if she were searching for gold. But it was iron she was after. Specifically, she was searching for iron cramps that hold together stones that make up the monument. Marcotte was part of a team from Pennsylvania-based CVM engineers at the monument Saturday assessing the historic structure in preparation for a restoration to begin next spring. The $3 million restoration is the first project in a plan by the Mount Vernon Place Conservancy to make improvements to Mount Vernon Square, which is made up of the monument and four public squares surrounding it. The conservancy was formed to raise money to improve and manage the site.

Engineers studying the need for a general aviation airport in Howard County said last night they plan to recommend a site in about five months."The site selection process could also include a no-build option," engineer Gary M. Luczak of Timonium told a gathering of about 75 people at the county office building.The type of general aviation facility envisioned for Howard would accommodate recreational pilots and businesses using privately owned single-engine aircraft or light, twin-engine aircraft, the group was told.

A recent editorial stated that "The whole nation was metaphorically holding its breath last week as Hurricane Isaac bore down on New Orleans, almost seven years to the day after Hurricane Katrina destroyed large parts of the city" ("We built that," Sept. 3). The fact of the matter is that the flooding of New Orleans was overwhelmingly the fault of the Army Corps of Engineers - who were solely responsible for designing and building the levee system they knew to be flawed - not the hurricane itself.

Mattresses are propped along the walls of the union hall in Little Italy, the bedding piled on chairs, as anxious union members sit inside in a round-the-clock state of siege.Since the shipboard engineers broke away from their parent union Jan. 16 in a fight centered on control of the $1.2 billion pension fund, they have expected the national union squad to arrive and seize possession of the hall and pension office.The parent union has "taken over the halls in Norfolk and Portland," reports Gordon M. Ward, as he listens over the phone to the news of the occupation of division offices in the Virginia and Oregon ports.

Groups of sixth-graders at Linthicum Elementary School pushed and pulled toothpicks and marshmallows yesterday, trying to build a bridge that would support a box of pennies and resist the urge to eat the marshmallows at the same time.They were among students throughout the county getting a glimpse of life as an engineer as part of Discover E program, started in 1990 by the National Society of Professional Engineers to encourage students to pursue careers in engineering.Engineers from Westinghouse have visited six schools in Anne Arundel County this year, showing students videos, conducting hands-on experiments and explaining their jobs.

Whatever becomes of 1,400 surplus acres at Fort George G. Meade, Army engineers say the environment will remain unharmed.Other government agencies, naturalists and the base's Odenton neighbors will havea chance to rebut that assessment tonight.The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will hold a 7 p.m. public hearing at Meade High School on its draft Environmental Impact Statement.The statement outlines the alternatives being considered for the 1,400 acres, which includes the 400-acre Tipton Airfield and a sanitarylandfill.

Men and women wearing hairnets, hard hats, safety glasses and bright-orange vests wended their way through Domino Sugars' Baltimore refinery Tuesday - there to look, not work. The manufacturing engineers and engineering students toured Domino as part of an international conference in town this week, a chance for boosters to get people thinking of Baltimore-area manufacturing in present and future tense rather than past. The Society of Manufacturing Engineers says new-wave manufacturing - 3-D printing, specifically - is one reason officials decided to meet in Baltimore this year.

Walter E. Woodford Jr., a state highway engineer and executive who supervised road construction projects from Ocean City to Garrett County and headed the building of the second span of the Bay Bridge in 1973, died of congestive heart failure May 22 at the Hospice Center in Centreville. He was 88 and had lived in Timonium and Centreville. "If you are a transportation engineer, you have to say he was a key player in the greatest generation of highway engineers, those who built the national interstate system, the largest public works project in our history," said former Maryland Transportation Secretary William K. Hellmann.

Lewis E. Porter, a retired civil engineer who during his more than four-decade career designed roads and highways for the Baltimore County Department of Public Works, died May 18 from mesothelioma at his Wiltondale home. He was 75. The son of an accountant and an artist, Lewis Emil Porter was born in Baltimore and raised in Howard Park. After graduating from the Polytechnic Institute in 1955, he served in the Army. Mr. Porter earned a degree in civil engineering in 1964 from the Johns Hopkins University and worked as a surveyor for Sutcliff Surveying Co. In 1967, he began his career with the Baltimore County Department of Public Works, where he designed roads and highways until retiring in 2000.

Republicans and Democrats appear to agree on at least one thing: that the United States is facing a STEM (science, technology engineering and math) crisis. In his most recent State of the Union address, President Barack Obama declared that he wants to "reward schools" that focus on STEM classes, for they are "the skills today's employers are looking for to fill jobs right now and in the future. " And as far to the other end of the political spectrum as you can get, Gov. Rick Perry of Texas deemed May 6-12 to be the first ever "Celebration of STEM Education Week in Texas.

Robert M. Douglass, former chief engineer of Baltimore Gas & Electric Co.'s Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant, died Monday of cancer at his home in Port Republic, Calvert County. He was 88. The son of an electrical engineer and a homemaker, Robert Mann Douglass was born in Hartford, Conn., and raised in Wethersfield, Conn., where he graduated in 1942 from Wethersfield High School. He served as a paratrooper with the 11th Airborne in the Pacific and with occupying forces in Japan during World War II. After the war, he enrolled at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., where he earned his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering in 1950.

William J. "Bill" Turcovski, a Northrop Grumman electrical engineer who enjoyed antiquing, died May 7 from pneumonia at Anne Arundel Medical Center in Annapolis. He was 52. The son of a supervisor and a homemaker, William John Turcovski was born and raised in Altoona, Pa., where he graduated in 1978 from Altoona Area High School. After graduating in 1982 with a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Pennsylvania State University, he began his career at Westinghouse Electric Corp.'s Linthicum plant, which is now Northrop Grumman.

Engineers have some of the most exciting jobs in the world. They were involved in designing the Apollo moon rocket, building the Bay Bridge and developing Nintendo video games.But the vast majority of middle-school students in metropolitan Baltimore have little, if any, awareness of the things engineers do unless one of their parents, a relative or a neighbor is in the profession. If they think about engineers at all, it is usually to classify them as the nerds of the American work force.

Mattresses are propped along the walls of the union hall in Little Italy, the bedding piled on chairs, as anxious union members sit inside in a round-the-clock state of siege.Since the shipboard engineers broke away from their parent union Jan. 16 in a fight centered on control of the $1.2 billion pension fund, they have expected the national union squad to arrive and seize possession of the hall and pension office."The scumbags have taken over the halls in Norfolk and Portland," reports Gordon M. Ward, as he listens to the news over the phone of the occupation of division offices in the Virginia and Oregon ports.