The long version.
Field notes and what I learned.
A working archive of the jobs I've held — what the work actually looked like, photos from the field and the shop, and the handful of things worth remembering for the next one.
Kiewit Infrastructure
2023 — Now
Field engineering on a multi-year highway expansion. Most days are spent between the trailer and the deck — chasing RFIs, walking the work with the super, and keeping the paper version of the project in step with what's actually being built.
- 01Owning the RFI log for the structures package — writing, tracking, and closing out.
- 02Daily field reports and quantity tracking against the pay applications.
- 03Pre-task plans catch most of what would have been an RFI later. The ten minutes is worth it.
- 04Field photos beat field notes. Date and location on every set.
City Public Works
2021 — 2022
Topographic survey and records cleanup for the city's drainage and right-of-way assets. First real exposure to how municipal infrastructure actually gets maintained — and how much of the work is just reconciling what the field shows with what the records claim.
- 01Ran the rod for the corridor survey; learned the value of a clean control network.
- 02Old as-builts lie. Trust the field measurement and write down who measured it.
- 03Naming conventions outlive everyone. Pick one and document it.
Steel Bridge Team
2022 — 2023
Ran the fabrication side of a competition steel bridge. Cut, welded, fit, fixed, and timed the build until it stopped breaking. Earned 2nd at regionals after a long six weeks in the shop.
- 01Build time on the floor is decided by how clean the fixturing is, not by raw speed.
- 02Wrote the weld QA checklist that caught a near-disqualifier in the deflection test.
- 03Eleven practice builds before regionals. The schedule was the win.