So what if geeks can’t lift heavy weights? They sure can build bridges to do their lifting for them. And that’s exactly what Peter Sandor of Hungary has done. He built a 967 gram bridge made of spaghetti that was able to hold a whopping 384.06 kg, before it shattered into pieces.
The bridge was made for Okanagan College’s 29th annual Spaghetti Bridge Contest, in Kelowna, Canada, as a part of Engineering Week. Contestants from around the world brought in structures made of spaghetti to be tested by pressure added in increments. The bridge that held the maximum weight before it broke was declared the winner. Sandor, a student of engineering at the College of Nyiregyhaza, in Hungary, was awarded the ‘heavyweight champion’ title, hands-down. The pasta-engineering efforts of this 23-year-old bright young student won him $1500.
Photo by Michelle Lowry
Interestingly, this isn’t his first attempt at building spaghetti bridges. Sandor had unsuccessfully taken part in 12 such competitions before, with 3 trips to the Kelowna contest alone. The 13th time proved to be lucky for him. “I’m very happy to have finally won,” he said. “I’m a maximalist sort of person, so I try to learn a little bit from each bridge that fails.” The bridge Sandor made was created from durum wheat pasta from Sandor’s homeland, Hungary. While at the contest it was able to withstand more than twice the weight that any of the others could, it still didn’t match up to the event record, which stands at 443 kg. When asked what the key to his success was, Sandor had only this to say – Accuracy of Architecture. Well done, dude!
Photo by Michelle Lowry
Source: The Daily Courier
