(Psst: RCN is Florida-bound to put on R-CON Digital Twins/gratuitously apply bronzer/wrestle alligators. The Re/Cap will catch ya in two weeks!)
Until then, bask in that glee of a new passport stamp Re/Cappers, you’re off to Somalia today for a lead story on the innovation and women engineers rebuilding the war-torn capital of Mogadishu.
What the two women are accomplishing is already the stuff of legends, even though they’re like ¼ legendary-tier age (early 20s!).
But for a female engineer whose legendary concrete is long dry - and whose work happened to be formative for the Somali women - one need look no further than Elsie Eaves, a woman of more firsts than Madonna on charts.
Long before "big data" became a buzzword, the criminally-underrated Eaves was pioneering systematic approaches to construction market analysis, cost tracking, and industry intelligence that continue to shape how we understand construction and engineering today.
Born in Idaho Springs, Colorado in 1898, Eaves earned her civil engineering degree at the University of Colorado at Boulder in 1920. She was immediately plucked by the U.S. Bureau of Public Roads and the Colorado State Highway Department. Her hands-on passion, shrewd engineering, and knack for data were so obvious that in 1927, she became the first woman in the American Society of Civil Engineers.
Then she made the decision that transformed her career, and the modern premise of construction data.
She moved to New York City to work as an assistant on market surveys for Engineering News-Record. She was quickly promoted (an Elsie motif) to Manager of Construction Economics, while being tapped for Director of Market Surveys for a separate publication, Construction Methods and Equipment. Then In 1932 - people, WWII was still seven years away - Eaves became the manager of Business News. By then an established fulcrum of engineering expertise and market intelligence, she was crucial in revitalizing construction during and after The Great Depression.
From one global catastrophe to the next, she organized ENR’s measurement of “Post War Planning,” converting this data into the first continuous inventory of planned construction after WWII. This became ENR’s “Backlog of Proposed Construction,” a model for modern project management databases.
Eaves' MVP-tier AEC contribution came via her work with construction cost indexes. While ENR had introduced its CCIs in 1921, it was Elsie’s prodigious approach to data collection, analysis, and presentation that morphed them from simple tracking tools, into the industry's definitive benchmarks. These grew essential for project estimation, contract escalation clauses, and economic analysis throughout construction. She still wasn’t satisfied, becoming a founding member of the Society of Women Engineers in 1950, and the American Association of Cost Engineers in 1956, helping expedite professional standards for the discipline.
After retiring in 1963, Eaves advised the International Executive Service Corps about construction costs in Iran…before advising countless organizations, universities, and engineers.
Yeah, Elsie Eaves was “an engineer.” But more than that, she was an engineer of modern engineering. She was translating construction chaos into coherent market intelligence when most engineers were still calculating loads with slide rules. She laid the groundwork for how we track, estimate, and justify the built environment.
That backlog of proposed construction? The cost indexes? The very idea that data could guide policy, budgeting, and long-term planning in AEC - all of it constitutes her status as a torchbearer. And as we’ll soon cover, women in Somalia are now carrying it.
Elsie Eaves receiving her Society of Women Engineers Fellow Award. Image credit Society of Women Engineers
What’s Cappenin’ This Week
Quick ‘Caps
The Re/Cap Podcast: Formula Won: The History of Metrology & Reality Capture in Auto Racing
It was in 1991 that, when the Gulf War was ending, the Somali Civil War was beginning. Now older than some of you reading this, the ongoing, albeit evolved conflict has long thwarted infrastructural progress.
This rings loudest in the capital city of Mogadishu, where the echoes of violence manifest as decimated ruins. But a sequence of daring investments and fortified security measures have galvanized construction. And yet, given the socioeconomic and religious fabric of the nation, that isn’t even the biggest surprise.
That award, would be the fact that women, like engineers Fathi Mohamed Abdi and Saadia Ahmed Omar of Arkan Engineering Services, are guiding it.
Engineers Fathi Mohamed Abdi and Saadia Ahmed Omar calling the shots. Image credit Mohamud Abdisamad/BBC
"Mogadishu needs us," the 24-year-old Omar told BBC in a stirring, yet beautiful article. "When I was young, this city was in chaos. Now, we are part of its reconstruction."
“Part” may be humble phrasing; Omar and Abdi have overseen over 30 multimillion-dollar projects.
Much of the barrier breakage - and requisite technological demand - stem from diaspora investments, fortified security measures, and resolute commitment from the Somali Engineers Association. This trio of transformation has erected 6,000 new buildings in Mogadishu, which with the added context of female handprints and modern innovation’s imprints, would have sounded like feel-good Hollywood fiction five years ago.
BBC’s profound non-fiction tale is linked below, profiling the two young engineers and many like them, the threat of terror groups, special sand, MEP, legislation around commercial & residential, and the dilemma of maintaining Mogadishu’s historical character.
By definition, a crisis is, in its moment, the most dangerous thing.
The second most dangerous thing can be not knowing where to go.
It was all too evident during a recent 911 call in Fulton County, Illinois, when a dispatcher couldn’t locate a cross-country field, near which two adults went to fisticuffs (sports parents…sigh).
But it provided the caller, Chris Helle - who happens to be Fulton County’s Emergency Management Director and 911 Coordinator - a lightbulb moment. And like a squad car with NOS, it’s taking off across the state, and possibly the nation.
The Web CAD Monitor system displays how indoor school maps are combined with aerial imagery and live emergency vehicle locations. Image credit Esri
A recent Esri blog post spells out how Helle teamed with a 911 Dispatch Director and a GIS Director at Western Illinois University, to 3D scan school interiors & zones, then create basemaps able to be edited. There’s a host of benefits, but perhaps most impactful is that every element of the specialized map is a “dispatchable location,” code for dispatchers being able to direct responders to specific school rooms/sites as if they were ordinary street addresses.
Officially called ‘Next Generation 911’, it’s been field tested. Notably, the LiDAR-fueled, real-time mapping solutions have trimmed minutes in a (later shown to be a false alarm) active shooter drill, as well as a medical emergency in which a choking elementary student was aided.
Case study up on the encouraging innovation below, exploring the roots of the collab, handheld scanning, color coding, standardization, software, pitfalls of paper maps, rural vs. urban mapping, student involvement, and an analogy of the McDonald's golden arches.
What a Wonderful (XR) World!
When Louis Armstrong sang about seeing trees of green and skies of blue, he probably never imagined we'd eventually be able to paint rainbows directly onto our retinas or add dancing unicorns to those red roses to boot.
AWE 2025 proved that the world Armstrong celebrated is about to get even more wonderful, and decidedly more interactive. And in an exquisite recap tailor-made to be Re/Capped, Tom's Guide has curated the seven most eye-catching XR gadgets that emerged from the expo floor.
Plot twist - the real word was just a beta version all along! Image credit Charlie Fink/Forbes
From tactile feedback systems that let you feel virtual worlds to accessories that blur the line between digital fantasy and physical sensation, this year's standout gadgets represent a fascinating mix of the practical and the wonderfully absurd. Tom's Guide's experts sifted through the prototypes, business-focused gear, and room-sized contraptions to find the devices that actually matter for the future of extended reality.
What makes this roundup particularly intriguing is how it balances genuine innovation with real-world feasibility. Not every amazing demo at AWE 2025 is destined for your living room, but these seven selections suggest which directions the XR industry is seriously pursuing.
Oh, and for a more philosophical postgame analysis, extend your reality to Forbes’ take on the festivities
May 27 was a big day for Dubai this year.
No, there was neither a completion of a building that looks like a Salvador Dali cutting-room floor piece, nor a new world record for the most gold leaf in a cappuccino. But there was a major announcement for the ambitious DFR (drone-as-first responder) program of the Dubai Police Department.
Accompanied by representation from Unmanned Aerial Systems Centre (UASC), DPD formally announced a partnership with AirHub, a global provider of drone operations and fleet management software. Heaps of policing tasks, from traffic control and service calls to emergency navigation and aerial monitoring, will be optimized through AirHub’s Drone Operations Center.
And thanks to AirHub CEO Stephan van Vuren’s interview with Commercial UAV News last week, we have more details and visions than Dubai has Bugattis.
Dubai Police, Unmanned Aerial Systems Centre, AirHub, and a dope uniform. Image credit AirHub
Framed around specifics of the DPD workflows and what first responders worldwide can learn from it, van Vuren and CUAV News’ Jeremiah Karpowicz explore integration obstacles, fleet management, pilot training, complexity in team management upon scaling, data security & privacy, and combining ambition with structure to become “the most forward-leaning Drone-as-a-First Responder in the world.”
Artistic representation of Pennsylvania’s South Fork Dam Failure of 1889. Image credit National Park Service/Harpers Ferry Center
The failure of Pennsylvania’s South Fork Dam in 1889 exemplifies the peril of a secret kept too long. A manmade hazard cloaked in trees and leisure, it disguised stability through the simple fact that it hadn’t yet failed. When it finally did, the result went far beyond hydraulic violence; it became the deadliest dam failure in U.S. history, born of human complacency, social privilege, and flagrant disregard for what lies beneath.
The dam, originally constructed in the 1840s as part of Pennsylvania’s canal system, was abandoned after a partial breach in 1862. When the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club acquired the site in the late 1870s, they rebuilt the dam with little regard for engineering standards. The reconstruction was overseen by individuals with no formal engineering background, while critical safety features, a la the original discharge pipes for controlled drawdown, were never replaced.
Beyond the missing pipes, the Club lowered the dam crest to accommodate a carriage road, reducing its ability to withstand high water. Fish screens were installed across the spillway, inadvertently trapping debris and slowing emergency outflow. These ostensibly minor changes critically compromised the dam’s already weakened design, turning a marginal structure into a ticking time bomb. Lastly, the embankment itself was rebuilt with poorly placed material and suffered from chronic seepage and a central sag, the legacy of the earlier breach left inadequately repaired.
Warnings from engineers and local industrial leaders about the dam’s vulnerabilities were dismissed by the Club’s leadership, who prioritized their leisure over technical caution. As the decades passed, the dam became a backdrop for the elite’s summer retreats, while the industrial city of Johnstown, downstream and largely unaware of the dam’s true condition, continued its daily grind.
On the night of May 30, 1889, an extraordinary rainstorm filled Lake Conemaugh at a rate of nearly ten inches per hour. By morning, the dam was overtopped. The only spillway was partially blocked by fish screens, and there was no way to lower the water level. As water began to flow over the crest, it initiated headcutting and erosion - classic geotechnical failure mechanisms in earthen dams. The initial breach quickly escalated into a catastrophic collapse, unleashing 20 million tons of water down the Little Conemaugh River valley. The flood wave obliterated everything in its path, culminating in a debris-choked inferno at Johnstown’s Stone Bridge. $17 million in property damage, 1,600 homes, and 2,209 fatalities later, and America had experienced unprecedented dam-related devastation.
136 years may have passed, but the structures of today can host problems similar to those of the South Fork Dam. Thus, grasping how and why reality capture and neighboring innovations could have theoretically played a role in 1889, could prevent the loss of life today.
LiDAR, photogrammetry, and Gaussian splatting could have produced precise 3D models of the dam and its surroundings, models sensitive enough to reveal subtle deformations, settlement, sagging, and seepage. The poorly compacted fill from the 1862 breach, left unresolved during reconstruction, would have been clearly visible, offering quantifiable evidence of structural decline.
BIM and digital twins could have served as a living record of the dam, documenting the removal of the original discharge pipes, the lowering of the crest, and the installation of fish screens - each change flagging an increased risk of overtopping and failure. Engineers could have even run simulations to test storm and blockage scenarios.
Drones equipped with visual and thermal sensors could have regularly inspected the dam face, crest, and spillway, detecting signs of cracking, erosion, or debris accumulation. Robotic crawlers might have monitored internal seepage paths and piping activity - signs of imminent failure that the human eye often misses until too late.
Most critically, a digital ecosystem of inspection records, design changes, and sensor data would have created a system of transparency and accountability. No longer could the dam’s condition be hidden behind closed gates or dismissed with empty assurances.
The South Fork Dam disaster is a meditation on the limits of human perception and the dangers of unheeded risk. The Club’s choices were shaped by convenience and optimism, not by rigorous observation or humility before the physical world. Thus, ever relevant to today’s built environment are reality capture and its digital kin. These deliver a philosophy of vigilance, a recognition that what we can’t see can, and often will, hurt us.
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