Forensic Engineering: Learning from Failures

Module 1: Introduction to Forensic Engineering
You will learn what Forensic Engineering is and why it is important. Furthermore, you will be introduced to basic concepts such as lifecycles of constructed facilities, failure, and damage.

Module 2: The Forensic Engineering Investigation
You will learn the basic steps of a Forensic Engineering process and how the TU Delft mind-set can help to perform these steps in a factual, reliable and systematic way.

Module 3*: Case from Civil Engineering
You will learn about various structural failure mechanisms and you will practice setting hypotheses for structural failures.

Module 4*: Case from Aerospace Engineering
You will learn about the failure mechanism fatigue in airplanes and how you can test to see whether this occurred.

Module 5*: Case from Biomechanical Engineering
You will learn about contamination of medical instruments and how technical and procedural aspects play a role.

Module 6: Course debriefing
In this week, the outcomes of the different cases from Modules 3-5 are revealed. Best practices and tips for the future are discussed and some results and contributions from participants are put in the spotlight!

*Modules 3-5 will be offered at the same time, to allow students to choose or prioritize their preferred module(s) based on their main areas of interest.