IPC Answers Call for Bridge Inspection

by

kavinusa

During the evening rush hour of August 1, 2007, a bridge supporting one of the busiest freeways in Minnesota unexpectedly collapsed, taking the lives of 13 people and injuring 145 more.1 To many leaders at the time, the Interstate 35W bridge disaster served as a wake-up call to the country’s deteriorating infrastructure. More than $100 million was ultimately paid out by the state and two contractors to survivors and families of the dead. Infrastructure Preservation Corporation (IPC) has an answer to this catastrophic problem in the form of new geophysical nondestructive inspection technology, leveraged through robotic systems.

Looking back over the last 50 years, such loss of life is not all that uncommon.2 In 1980, 35 people died when a freighter rammed one of the support columns of Tampa Bay’s Sunshine Skyway Bridge. In 1967, 32 vehicles plunged into the freezing Ohio River when the Silver Bridge between Point Pleasant, WV and Gallipolis, OH collapsed, taking the lives of 46 people”a 0.1-inch defect in a metal bar was indicated to be at fault.

Out of approximately 612,000 bridges in existence in the U.S., more than 55,000 of them are in need of repair3″and Americans cross these endangered structures 185 million times per day.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smitDJhAqKQ[/youtube]

New solutions, such as that developed by IPC, points the way to saving countless lives”as well as billions in repairs”by isolating structural faults before they become serious issues.4 Robotic systems leverage geophysical nondestructive technology (NDT) protocols to, in effect, x-ray concrete and other infrastructure to identify early-stage deterioration, enabling recommendation of repairs before deterioration spreads and compromises the structure’s ability to carry its design loads. Proper diagnosis allows planning and repair of early-stage deterioration, which is also financially preferable, in that it prolongs infrastructure service life expectancy.

“Traditional infrastructure inspection methods are over 50 years old and are thus quite outdated,” said Doug Thaler, president of IPC. “They are manual in nature and often deliver subjective results. There are new solutions that provide quantitative data, allowing departments of transportation (DOTs) to better allocate existing maintenance budgets.”

IPC’s solutions, now patented or in patent pending status, constitute the first commercially viable robotic inspection methods in the industry. These technologies produce modern archived, quantitative inspection data that can help infrastructure asset managers to better manage preservation and extension of service life of critical infrastructure assets. For more information please visit https://www.infrastructurepc.com/.

About Infrastructure Preservation Corporation:

An infrastructure crisis of herculean proportions now exists in the U.S. At every level, the U.S. government is struggling with how to repair, replace and maintain the nation’s aging bridges, roads, water management systems and more. Infrastructure failures could have significant impacts on daily life if action is not taken. Municipal, state and federal departments of transportation (DOTs) do not have the funds to replace aging infrastructure and are looking for ways to prolong service life.

Infrastructure Preservation Corporation (IPC) is a robotics manufacturer and professional services engineering company that delivers infrastructure inspection services using reliable and accurate imaging based on geophysical nondestructive testing (NDT) and robotic technologies. Based in Clearwater, FL, IPC has developed its solutions and services to detect early-stage infrastructure degradation and deterioration in concrete and steel structures. From bridges to utility or communication towers and other public/private infrastructure, IPC technologies deliver “next generation” alternatives to disrupt markets that are still using manual inspection methods. For more information, visit www.infrastructurepc.com.

To know more about please follow this link:

Non Destructive Testing

and

Ground Penetrating Radar

.

Article Source:

eArticlesOnline.com}

Posted in Public Relations

Submitted by: Brian Chow

Do you need to request products samples for an event you are organizing? Do you need to request bulk freebies for fundraising? Do you need to find sponsors for product donations?

Here are strategies to help you request freebies and samples from companies and sponsors. You should be aware that the offers posted on many free stuff sites are not suitable for bulk requests. These sites list free stuff offered by corporations that use free offers to promote their products and services. Generally, these companies limit their samples to one per person, family, or an organization.

The best way to request multiple samples is to approach national and local manufacturers, stores, or companies directly. Visit their web sites and search for contact information of their corporate giving departments, public relations, or customer services. Then, email, write, or call to request the samples. You should consider writing letters using your organizations letterheads. In your letters, be sure to explain what you would like to request, why you need them, how you are going to use them, and how you would recognize the companies for their generosity.

When you contact large, national companies, you may want to find out if the companies have formal corporate giving policies. Use a search engine and search for the corporate giving or donation policies. Keywords to try are the companys name and corporate giving or the companys name and donation. Then, determine if your events or your organizations correspond to the policies, and compose your letter, following the instructions listed in the policies.

You may have better response rates from local companies. Try contacting companies that have target markets of your event or your organization. For example, I helped to organize a youth artwork contest. I contacted local fast food companies and youth clothing companies for the contest prizes. I was able to get a large duffle bag, a sweatshirt, and several gift certificates from local businesses.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCW0VsfR9FM[/youtube]

When you are successful in requesting the samples, be sure to write thank you letters, including photos and videos to show how the samples were used and how the companies received recognitions.

Here are additional resources to help you request multiple free samples:

1. Read Secret Ways to Get Free Stuff to find more examples of contacting companies directly and asking for free stuff.

http://freestuffpage.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3469

2. Contact nonprofit groups such as Gifts in Kind International. These groups take extra inventories from manufacturers and redistribute them to other nonprofits. You may have to complete applications and wait to use these services.

http://www.giftsinkind.org/

3. Visit fundraising sites for resources at Yahoo! Directory of Fundraising

http://dir.yahoo.com/Society_and_Culture/Issues_and_Causes/Philanthropy/Nonprofit_Resources/Fund_Raising/

4. Read books on fundraising. Visit the site below for fundraising titles that you are able to locate in your local libraries.

http://govolunteer.ca/library/Search.do?keyword=Fundraising

Good luck and best wishes on your efforts in requesting multiple samples and donations.

About the Author: Brian Chow has been requesting freebies and samples on the web for over ten years. He is the operator of Free Stuff Page,

freestuffpage.com

, where you can get free samples, deals, contests, and more. Read more useful, related articles at the Frugal Living section at

freestuffpage.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=12

.

Source:

isnare.com

Permanent Link:

isnare.com/?aid=23851&ca=Business}

Posted in Public Relations