COLUMBIAMEMORIAL.ORG FALL 2023 3 Cale Ash, PE, SE, is the principal and group director at Degenkolb Engineers in Seattle. Ash is a structural engineer, project manager, and earthquake and tsunami safety advocate. He is one of the BuildCMH Expansion Project leaders. Ash joined Degenkolb Engineers in 2003. His work focuses on seismic evaluation and rehabilitating existing buildings. Some of his notable projects include the Seattle campus of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs; Ocosta Elementary School in Westport, Washington; many other K – 12 seismic retrofits; and the evacuation tower in Tokeland, Washington. Q What excites or interests you most about the CMH project? A “Something that really resonates with me is the hospital providing a resilient facility for the community and the patients. “We see this as a great opportunity to bring forward the work we’ve done with other coastal communities. Plus, we have experience navigating FEMA grants. Grant funding will help offset the cost premium to make the hospital tsunami-resilient. We’ve been working with CMH to pursue FEMA grants since we started working together in 2021.” Q What are some other notable projects you’ve worked on? A “The first half of my career, I worked very closely on many projects for the Department of Veterans Affairs. I completed a seismic evaluation of four buildings at the Seattle campus. I also redesigned the retrofit of those buildings, including their main hospital building, two patient towers and their community living center. “Similar to CMH, those buildings were built in the 1980s, so the buildings were vulnerable to earthquake damage. We were able to identify the weaknesses and improve them so they could work through an earthquake.” Q What does your role entail? A “For the expansion hospital, I’m working to understand project goals, specifically resiliency goals, and working with ZGF [project architect] on how we achieve those for the size of the building, for the existing hospital and the future uses for the hospital. “We looked at the hospital’s current design to see how the building would work for future needs. The current hospital was built in the 1970s, before engineers and seismologists knew about the Cascadia Subduction Zone. They didn’t consider there could be a big hazard close to the project site. “There are engineering standards that help us guide the process of the existing building. That entails reviewing the building design and almost reverse engineering to understand how strong it is. [We’re looking to see] if there are areas that could be damaged if there was an earthquake. “We combine that with future plans for the expansion. We look at the floor plan and where we can provide additional structure to the building so it can resist shaking in case of an earthquake. We are enhancing structural bones to resist earthquake forces.” Get to know the structural engineer
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