In this blog, I will introduce you to the process by which the drinking water facilities and distribution networks got more or less destroyed in Port-Au-Prince, Haiti. And also how various aid organizations and their environmental engineering unit with the help of citizens of Haiti brought about the rain water harvesting system, an alternative way to gather water to be used for domestic and other use.

Early 2010, an earthquake of a moderately high magnitude struck the main source of drinking water supplies and distribution networks in Port-Au-Prince, the capital of Haiti. After the occurrence of the earthquake, the emergency response and humanitarian assistance organizations began developing ways to help bring about a reasonable amount of standards for hygiene and water. For water, which is a very important aspect, the rain water harvest was used to revive a considerable amount of water back to be used.

Rain water harvesting is a very useful method of water collection in the sense that it has been used for a very long while in Haiti because of the abundant rainfall available. It all set up with the availability of some materials such as a roof area, gutters, drains, storage tanks and pressure boosting system. Its requires minimal capital and also does not cost a lot to maintain therefore it is affordable. This system also helps evade/prevent erosion as it diverts heavy rainfall to the storage unit. There are factors that affect rain water harvest though, these factors are

1. CONSUMPTION: This is the total number of use by the number of users and it is all added together and the average is gotten.
2. COLLECTION AREA: This is the projected area of the roof that will be used to collect the rain water, the bigger the collection areas are the more water available.
3. HARVEST COEFFICIENT: This is a record of water that avoided collection due to loss by leakage or spillage or were not at all good for use.
4. RAINFALL DATA: This is data collecting and examined after a long while of collection of answers. This data include: volume of rainfall, intensity of rainfall, duration of rainfall and also the frequency of the rainfall.

With  all these collection of rainfall water, there also treatment of these kind of water. This was the water families used for domestic activities and also used in drinking so calculations based on the amount of water collected and the amount of families per unit was taken to make it easier for treatment.

Finally, the main objective of the emergency response unit was to provide first world type drinking water, but this wasn’t possible because of the occurring disasters, funds and also the compact space of the environment for work. Therefore they had to do all that they could and was also accepted by the UN. And although the water being used was not as pure as the ones used in a properly setup city/area, because of the lifestyles of the residents of Haiti  they could tolerate 20-30 CFU of water.

In the  very broad occupation and study of engineering, there are various further aspects and specialties. For instance, Engineering can be divided into different kinds such as; Chemical engineering, Civil engineering, Mechanical engineering and much more. These various types of engineering can still be broken down furthermore. I shall be using Civil engineering as my example because this is what I’m interested in.

Civil engineering is a professional engineering discipline that deals with the design, construction, and maintenance of the physical and naturally built environment, including works like roads, bridges, canals, dams, and buildings. Civil engineering, as said earlier is furthermore divided into various types of civil engineering such as environmental, geotechnical, structural, to mention a few.

Now with knowledge of all I’ve talked about, we go down to the main point which is the career paths for technical professionals in engineering. Now, assume or imagine that you are an environmental engineer, there are different aspects you choose from; The administrative, the construction, the Degreed technical profession and the technical profession. Choosing the  degreed technical professional  career path, for new graduates, one does not go to an engineering company and start practicing their work directly. New graduates will have to undergo foundation projects until they garner the needed experience before actually practicing the job in itself and eventually being a master. This is done to get experience for further jobs as engineering is a complex field. Another reason this is done is to enable more clarity for the newly graduated student to choose which division/career path to undergo. There are three main career paths and they are; technical management, technical specialist (consists of technical gurus and project managers) and the client service management.

• The role of the technical managers is to manage/guide a group of staff and monitoring the projects by the staff they manage.
• The technical gurus of the technical specialist aspect are in charge of the technical operations solely.
• The project managers in the technical aspect are responsible for carrying out environmental projects

• And finally, the client service managers manager clients/consumers of the product.

Finally, for those new graduates or current college students who want to embark on engineering various things should be done. Things such as having a good academic record, having a some experience by doing internships and CO-OP and be sure and specific of what aspect and sub aspect of engineering you wish to embark.

Welcome to Blogs.cas.suffolk.edu. This is your first post. Edit or delete it under Manage>Posts or make a new one under Write>Posts then start blogging! Be sure to visit the Design tab to choose a new look for your blog as well.

Also, for immediate “how-to’s” visit the Tutorials section, or the Getting Started section.