Isambard Kingdom Brunel
Discussion
Can you imagine Isambard Kingdom Brunel trying to do everything he achieved in this day and age?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isambard_Kingdom_Brun...
1. Planning permission for the Great Western Railway for example.
2. Getting the required Health & Safety for all the work that he undertook i.e. Clifton Suspension Bridge, Thames Tunnel, building steamships?
3. Just think about all of the wealth / employment / infrastructure he generated.
4. What has the current Government actually built in the last 13 years?
This is why this country is f
ked, no one is allowed to take any risks anymore, no one makes anything of any note, this is why we have no industry......it is so depressing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isambard_Kingdom_Brun...
1. Planning permission for the Great Western Railway for example.
2. Getting the required Health & Safety for all the work that he undertook i.e. Clifton Suspension Bridge, Thames Tunnel, building steamships?
3. Just think about all of the wealth / employment / infrastructure he generated.
4. What has the current Government actually built in the last 13 years?
This is why this country is f
ked, no one is allowed to take any risks anymore, no one makes anything of any note, this is why we have no industry......it is so depressing.I don't think too many died compared to other projects of the time, I'm sure his work on the Crimean War hospital saved more lives than were ever lost on his industrial projects - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isambard_Kingdom_Brun...
Story was of an old man and his apprentice boy who vanished during the building of the Great Eastern. But no skeletons were ever found when the ship was broken up. Inspection hatches would have prevented anyone getting trapped and the manner of manual riveted construction would have meant they couldn't have been sealed up anyway.
odyssey2200 said:
IIRC there was a rumour that 2 small boys were "built into" the hull of one of his ships as they had to be inside to allow the final assembly.
I think that one is a urban myth... Think about it, even in a yard on the scale of that which the Great Eastern was built in could two people just "dissapear" and nobody would bat an eyelid about it? The consensus is that it was a story dreampt up by the scrap merhcant who broke the ship to garner some publicity.Brunel is one of my heroes, the guy was a legend. I'd thoroughlt recommend the Rolt biography for anybody interested, excellent book.
On the subject of fatalities on his projects, the box tunnel on the GWR is a good example. It was hewn from solid rock and left unlined, the rock was blasted with explosives and worked with picks....statistically you were more likely to die working in the tunnel than fighting in the trenches during the First World War.
Dunk76 said:
Fittster said:
Didn't lots of people die on his projects?
Well yes, but then lots of people died doing other stuff too during that period. It's only in the last thirty years that we've tried to make going to work something unlikely to kill you... even if you're in the Army.His Wikipedia page is cack, underselling him by a huge margin.
vetteheadracer said:
Can you imagine Isambard Kingdom Brunel trying to do everything he achieved in this day and age?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isambard_Kingdom_Brun...
1. Planning permission for the Great Western Railway for example.
2. Getting the required Health & Safety for all the work that he undertook i.e. Clifton Suspension Bridge, Thames Tunnel, building steamships?
3. Just think about all of the wealth / employment / infrastructure he generated.
4. What has the current Government actually built in the last 13 years?
This is why this country is fked, no one is allowed to take any risks anymore, no one makes anything of any note, this is why we have no industry......it is so depressing.
A few points:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isambard_Kingdom_Brun...
1. Planning permission for the Great Western Railway for example.
2. Getting the required Health & Safety for all the work that he undertook i.e. Clifton Suspension Bridge, Thames Tunnel, building steamships?
3. Just think about all of the wealth / employment / infrastructure he generated.
4. What has the current Government actually built in the last 13 years?
This is why this country is f
ked, no one is allowed to take any risks anymore, no one makes anything of any note, this is why we have no industry......it is so depressing.1. Whilst there was no planning legislation in IKB's day, railways were built by the means of passing an Act of Parliament, which compelled owners to sell their land. That's not to say there wasn't the odd argument or two along the way! Essentially an early form of compulsory purchase, and new railways such as the CTRL are also authorised by the same arrangements.
2. Whilst he worked on the Thames tunnel, the idea was his father's, Marc Brunel.
3. The Clifton suspension bridge was Brunel's idea, but it was not completed until 1864, 5 years after his death and as a memorial. I shouldn't get too concerned about what the Government has built, but in the last half century or so we've seen a number of impressive bridges built (two across the Severn, the Forth Road Bridge and the Tamar bridge spring immediately to mind) and we also had something to do with building the Channel Tunnel
3. Health & Safety (don't get me started
). The trouble is that these days we live in a compensation culture, where whatever goes wrong is somebody else's fault. Where once you went arse over tit on a cracked paving stone and cursed yourself for failing to see it coming, now you sue the council.Unfortunately, you can't have people suing the arse off each other for compenastion and not expect a H&S culture to grow up to minimise the claims
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