The Field of Civil Engineering

By: Izrul Fizal

The field of civil engineering is a very broad and vast one. In general, this field encompasses public works in regards to maintaining, constructing, and planning fixed structures within the area. In essence, the civil engineering field covers areas that are related to civilization, water, and earth. The vast area of civil engineering covers so many different areas that it is then broken up into many different sub-categories or sub-disciplines.

General Civil Engineering

In this field, engineers deal with man-made projects and how they collaborate with the natural earth. For example, they may work on things such as land divisions, communications, electric, sewer, water, pavement, flood control, and grading of the land involved in the project. General engineers typically work closely with other specialized engineers and surveyors on a project site.

Structural Civil Engineering

This type of engineering is just as it sounds. It deals with the areas of structures such as building and bridges, in which they will design and analyze the structures in how they will deal with the various forces and stress that may be placed upon it. Some forces and stress may include earthquakes and wind. Their job is to determine the stability of the structure and design.

Fire Protection Civil Engineering

In this field, fire is the main priority and the safety of the environment and the people that live in it. They will be the specialized engineers that design the combative measures for fire fighting. An example of this would be those that create smoke control, sprinkler, and alarm systems.

Geo-Technical Civil Engineering

Geo-technical engineers are the ones that deal with how constructed structures interact with materials in the earth. Furthermore, they also deal with earth material constructed structures. This field has everything to do with the earth, such as soil, slopes, walls, embankments, and other earth related procedures.

Of course, the above is just the tip of the iceberg. There are so many other areas of civil engineering such as transportation, environmental, hydraulic, water resources, construction, material science, and surveying engineering. The world of civil engineering encompasses a wide variety of different fields.

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