Citicorp Center

Ethical Issue In most ethics discussions of LeMessurier and the Citicorp Center, the main ethical issue addressed has revolved around LeMessurier s behavior after he found out about the vulnerability of the building of which he was structural engineer. William LeMessurier, who died in 2010, is widely regarded as an ethical hero of engineering. He is listed as a moral exemplar on... 

Reinhold (1985). One is reminded of the New York City building code that had not been updated to take into consideration structurally innovative buildings, like Citicorp Center. 

Like fee Citicorp Center, Challenger should not have been treated in fee same way feat familiar, well-understood, stable technological artifacts could. Instead, fee engineers involved, both at MTI and NASA, had ethical responsibilities to check out fee anomalies and novel design aspects and possible connections between them, and to recheck them, to make sure that they were reliable and stable, rather than simply to assume feat they were and to stipulate that recurrent risks were acceptable. ... 

Case 6 Citicorp Center Tower Specific ethical issues include ... 

Four columns or legs supporting the Citicorp Center s frame are positioned at the middle of each side of the building. LeMessurier designed a unique system of V-shaped wind braces on each facade, arranged in a chevron pattern, to transfer loads to the column. Construction of the Citicorp Center was completed in 1977. 

As a result of a June 1978 question from an engineering student, who was writing a paper on the Citicorp Center, LeMessurier reviewed his original design. He discovered ... 

Figure 12.5 The Citicorp Center s foiu columns were positioned in the middle of each of the building s four sides. (Source Adapted from Goldstein and Rubin 1996 and Whitbeck 1998.)...

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