Publication Number: FHWA-HRT-09-014
Date: June 2009

FHWA Offers Training Course on Bridge Safety Inspections

Equipping participants with essential knowledge and skills for conducting bridge inspections is the goal of a course available from the Federal Highway Administration's (FHWA) National Highway Institute (NHI) entitled Safety Inspection of In-Service Bridges (Course No. FHWA-NHI-130055).

The course will be held August 3-14, 2009, in Arlington, Virginia. Based on FHWA's Bridge Inspector's Reference Manual, it has been designed to fulfill the requirements of the National Bridge Inspection Standards for a comprehensive training course. Successful completion of the course will provide participants with the skills to evaluate a variety of bridges and determine the critical areas for inspection, including fatigue-prone details and common points of deterioration and distress. Participants will also be able to evaluate the severity of material deterioration and member distress and assign ratings according to coding guidance developed by FHWA or their State transportation agency, as well as determine when it is necessary to close a bridge because of imminent danger or when further inspection is required.

The safety inspection course is aimed at Federal, State, and local transportation agency employees involved in inspecting bridges or in charge of a bridge inspection unit. It is recommended that participants possess a background in bridge engineering or, alternately, have completed the NHI course, Engineering Concepts for Bridge Inspectors (Course No. FHWA-NHI-130054). The course fee is $1,400 per participant.

Additional course sessions are scheduled to be held in Montgomery, Alabama, from August 3-14, 2009, and Topeka, Kansas, from September 14-15, 2009. To register for any of the upcoming courses, visit www.nhi.fhwa.dot.gov/training. For more information on a particular session, contact the local coordinator listed below.

Arlington, Virginia, August 3-14, 2009 - Sherese Lyles at FHWA, 703-235-1212 (sherese.lyles@fhwa.dot.gov)

Montgomery, Alabama, August 3-14, 2009 - Benjamin Yates at the Alabama Department of Transportation, 334-242-6284 (yatesb@dot.state.al.us)

Topeka, Kansas, September 14-15, 2009 - Becky Welsh at the Kansas Department of Transportation, 785-291-3463 (beckyk@ksdot.org)

For more information about the course content, contact Tom Everett in FHWA's Office of Bridge Technology, 202-366-4675 (email: thomas.everett@fhwa.dot.gov).

Back to Articles in this Issue