Rail Disaster Challenge

Presented by The Smallpeice Trust

Monday 17th December 2012

Stewards Hall

Year 9 Able Gifted and Talented

 Imagine you are in a crisis team of railway engineers. An earthquake has occurred! Part of a railway track has been destroyed and a village has been left stranded on one side of a gorge without support aid or transport to get supplies over to them. This is the scenario faced by a group of 60 year 9 students working in teams of 5 .

Their task was to design and build a bridge on time and in budget, to support a metre length of railway track and a train with 100g load yet still have clearance beneath the bridge to allow a vehicle to pass.

Alarna Mace (9 VM) explains: ‘The main aim of the day was to form a bridge able to hold a track and a car that we also made. The bridge had to be made out of paper, masking tape, string and nuts and bolts. For equipment we used a hole punch and scissors. We also made a buggy out of a piece of plastic, wheels, motor, battery and wires. The aim was for the bridge to stand strong with a piece of track on top and the buggy had to run across it. I contributed to our team by making the car, by putting it together and making it able to run across the track with the 100g load. I enjoyed the day and learnt how to build a circuit.

Team D, Maddison Davies 9MT, Clairesse Earl 9DN, Chloe Eves 9RMP, Dylan Dezilva 9DN and Alex Dodd 9MT, won the challenge with the best bridge.

Alex Dodd 9MT said: ‘The day was great. I really enjoyed the day. I liked that the situation could have happened and allowed me to have fun in an educational environment.