In just the second year after their reintroduction to campus, Rose-Hulman's Steel Bridge team earned first place at the American Society of Civil Engineers Indiana-Kentucky Symposium and qualified for the national competition.

Throughout this year, the Steel Bridge team designed and fabricated parts of their structure, and during the competition, the team acted as human cranes to rapidly assemble their bridge. Teams were judged against three criteria—the speed of assembly, the strength of the bridge, and the structure's weight—while adhering to several constraints, including how much deflection the bridge could show under the weight of 2,500 pounds. The Rose-Hulman team assembled their 400-pound structure in approximately 18 minutes. 

"It's a nice feeling when you finish and have that sense of accomplishment," said team captain Lukas Lambert. 

The team, revitalized last year after a multiyear hiatus, overcame a significant learning curve. Most of last year's members graduated, leaving only two graduate students and a handful of then-first-year students to continue the team's growth. 

Now a sophomore civil engineering major, Lambert had spent most of last year learning and observing, including at last year's competition, where they placed third. Lambert applied what he learned in leading the AutoCAD design of this year's structure. 

"Last year, we did a three-dimensional truss instead of a two-dimensional truss, and while that was a lot better and more stable, it was a lot harder to make and kind of heavy," Lambert explained. "I saw last year that the bridges that did really well had the 2D truss, so we decided to do that this year."

Lambert, who aspires to be a structural engineer, also noted that the Rose-Hulman bridge is entirely student-built, whereas some of their competitors enlisted professional help. 

"It's a big thing to be proud of," he said. "It makes it a lot more difficult, but you're more familiar with the bridge when you're done with it." 

The team has also successfully navigated the challenges of restarting a student organization and competition team, including recruiting new members and sourcing materials. Now eight members strong, the Steel Bridge team connected with Benchmark Fabricated Steel, who graciously donated the steel for use in this year's bridge. The team is already making plans to continue constructing their legacy next year.

Rose-Hulman's Steel Bridge competition team enables students to bridge their classroom learning with their future aspirations, building structures and experiences that, on the competitive stage, truly beam.