Chapter 35: My Engineers

Since there are only four kids and the teacher, we don’t head back to the school. Mr. Bentley drops us off at our homes. There is still a lot of excitement from coming in 2nd. When we get to Tyler’s place, we all get out of the van. His Mom sees the big commotion in the driveway and comes outside to see why we didn’t just drop off her son and leave.

Tyler is jumping up and down in excitement as he tells her, “MOM, WE CAME IN SECOND.” She squeals in excitement and hugs her son then heads inside to collect her family so they could come out and congratulate the team.

It is almost 20 minutes before we climb back into the van for our next destination. This time it is Kim’s turn. She is an only daughter, and her parents are so proud of her that they get all teary-eyed hearing the news. Mrs. Huang even kisses me on the cheek.

When we get back in the van, I ask, “Mr. Bentley, would you mind dropping Elsa off first. I need to talk with her Dad for a minute. Besides, once you drop her off, you have to drive by my place to return the van.” He accepts my request and heads to Elsa’s.

Since it is just the three of us, he takes her inside to announce our victory to her family. I act the gentleman and collect her luggage. Once I get inside, her family has already assembled, and her Mom is giving her a big hug. Her Dad beams with pride as he shakes Mr. Bentley’s had. Mr. Berggern sees me standing at the door with his daughter’s bags and asks, “And who is this young man?”

It is Mr. Bentley’s turn to beam with pride, exclaiming, “This is the star of our team, Trent.”

I set Elsa’s bags on the floor, walk over and extend my hand.

“Mr. Berggern, Sir, I am extremely impressed with your daughter’s extensive engineering knowledge. You must be proud.”

Her Dad isn’t afraid to admit, “You have no idea. She is good to her Dad. All those years sitting, listening to me babble about my passion, she is a good daughter.”

“Sir, I don’t know if your daughter has told you about me. I’m the kid that is going to High School and university at the same time. I also have my own company. Elsa tells me you are an engineer that designs boats and is unemployed at the moment.”

He is a bit red-faced hearing about his inability to provide for his family but is man enough to admit his failing, “That is correct.”

“It just so happens, I need an engineer.”

He shakes his head and confesses, “The last company I worked for had a do not compete clause in my contract. There were some other issues, and I am no longer a PE(Profesional Engineer, it is a licensed title like Dr.) I can’t work as an engineer for almost another seven years.”

I let out a slight laugh and say, “The do not compete clause won’t be a problem. You will be working with skin on frame boats. That alone isn’t a full-time job, so I would like to use your skills with other non-boat related engineering. I assume you are not opposed to sticking your nose in a book and learning something new. Can you retake the test and get your PE status back?”

“It has been a while, but I’m sure it will not be a problem.”

“Good, tomorrow afternoon at 2:30, meet me at the school for a job interview. I will tell you more about the job then. Oh, and bring a copy of your old contract so we can see the specifics of your do not compete clause.”

You can see a bit of relief breaking through the pride he has for his daughter. He grabs my hand and shakes it vigorously, saying, “Are you sure you can afford a professional engineer. I’m guessing she told you about my last job. I’m willing to work for less than the going rate, but that is still a lot of money.”

“That is a lot better of a response than I have come to expect. I can understand your questioning about how a child could afford a PE. Rest assured, I am worth more than you think. It will not be a problem.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow at 2:30.”

Five minutes later, we are back in the van and on our way to my place. When we get there, Mr. Bentley comes in with me. Sam, Zlata and Dahlia are in the living room watching TV. Sam is the first to notice us and comments, “Uh oh. It can’t be good if your teacher has to come in and talk with us.”

I chuckle. Mr. Bentley states, “That isn’t the case at all. I just came in to congratulate you. Your child is our star. Thanks to him and Elsa, we came in second.”

I’m pleased to hear him mention Elsa’s contribution.

“I knew she scored just as good as me. She is really something.”

“You did better than her. In fact, with the way you answered your questions, they wanted to give you bonus points, but the rules don’t allow it.”

Sam is a bit confused and so asks, “What do you mean the way he answered his questions?”

Mr. Bentley shakes his head as he answers, “Many of the questions he gave two answers for. He would write: this is the answer you are looking for, this is the correct answer. Then he would explain why it was the right answer and why the answer we were looking for wouldn’t work. There were some that wanted to mark those questions wrong. Most of those marking his paper saw the validity in his answers. In the end, they were marked right. In all honesty, he took a big risk and almost cost us dearly.”

Answering questions that way is a habit I formed in the military. It is common with the engineering tests, especially the oral examinations, that there is more than one answer to a question. Usually, there was the book answer, and then there was the real answer. You have to know both. The answer you give people depends on who is asking. In the test, you give both answers. When they had me mentoring people, there were three answers I would teach: the book answer, the answer they were looking for, and what I would do instead.

As an example: The Canadian military got rid of non-synthetic refrigerants years before I joined. It takes a lot of work to change regulations, so none of the refrigerant regulations were ever updated. By the book, if you opened the hatch that goes down into Fridge Flats and you see a person on the deck, not moving, you are to close the hatch and yell, “Casualty, casualty, casualty, casualty in fridge flats.” And repeat that as loud as you can until you hear it piped through the ship. At the same time, you are to stand guard over the hatch and not let anybody down into Fridge Flats. The reason for this is because when non-synthetic refrigerants come in contact with heat, such as that produced by the fridge compressor, it turns into phosgene gas, which can be toxic depending on the amount of exposure. Until 2010 Canadian warships used oxygen candles in their firefighting breathing apparatuses. You couldn’t don the firefighting gear to save a person down there, or you would just make the gasses worse and possibly kill yourself. Only the Hazmat team wearing their air bottles are aloud down the hatch. In essence, if you see a buddy unconscious in fridge flats, sit back and let him die. That is the book answer.

They want you to say that there is no phosgene gas, so there is no risk wearing firefighting gear to save your buddy as you raise the alarm.

The truth of the matter is there was not an airtight seal to the deck below. If there were a refrigerant leak bad enough to kill somebody, then the casualty would be in Dry Stores, not Fridge flats. Even then, it is unlikely. If all the refrigerant were released from the system, it would only come up to your waist. The coolant isn’t poisonous, and you can inhale it without ill effect. All it does is displace oxygen, meaning you can inhale it but continuously doing so will cause you to get drowsy and fall asleep because of the lack of oxygen. If somebody doesn’t rescue you in a few minutes, you will die. If all the refrigerant leaked, you could walk around in Dry Stores with no ill effect. You just can’t crawl for more than a couple minutes. If you see a person on the deck in Fridge Flats or Dry Stores, you should go down there and investigate. If you wait for the rescue team or go put on a breathing apparatus, then if there was a refrigerant leak, you just killed your buddy because you took too long.

Most questions in the navy’s engineering world have answers like this. Not everybody supplies multiple answers in the tests, but it isn’t looked down upon. I find doing so often educates the instructors. In the oral examinations, when they expect multiple answers, they usually tell you or ask a follow-up question to pull the second answer out of you. In fact, in the senior levels of the oral tests, they often deliberately ask you questions where the correct answer is to say, “It’s time to throw all the regulations and books out.”

Dahlia queries, “Why would you answer like that? Isn’t there just one correct answer?”

“Things don’t always work in practice as they do in theory. School tends to delve in theory. Those are the answers they were looking for. Reality is usually a different matter. Where I gave two answers was where reality differed from the books.”

Sam just sits there, laughing at me and shaking his head. Zlata sits in amazement and asks, “How would you even know when the book was missing something like that?”

“I have led an interesting life.”

Knowing who I really am, Dahlia tries hard not to laugh.

Sam gets up and says, “Why don’t you sit down and join us for a beer to celebrate?”

Mr. Bentley replies, “Don’t mind if I do.” He then takes a seat in Grandpa’s chair. Sam leaves and comes back with a six-pack. He hands one to Zlata, and Mr. Bentley then tries to give me one.

“I can’t drink with a teacher. If anybody found out, he would get in a lot of trouble and likely fired.” Sam looks disappointed, so I add, “I know it is a point of honour for you to have a celebratory beer with me. We will have one as soon as he leaves.” This satisfies him. He grabs a beer for himself and places the rest on the coffee table.

Mr. Bentley only stays for a quick beer. As soon as he leaves, Sam grabs another six-pack. I end up being the responsible one and say, “Sam, we all have to get to bed soon. We only have time for one beer, not a couple.”

He doesn’t reply other than to hand me a beer, then one to Dahlia. She is a bit surprised and looks at her Mom before opening it. Zlata speaks up, “I’m not sure I like the idea of my 15-year-old daughter drinking.”

Sam complains, “It’s just this once. One beer isn’t going to kill her. It isn’t like we do this all the time.”