Voice of experience

Mr Gonsalves has been project engineer in charge of a long list of multimillion to multibillion dollar engineering developments mostly in the oil and gas sector. And at 89, he is convinced that engineers in charge of large projects need to master many different branches of the subject and have solid practical experience if they are too succeed. He has a wealth of experience in a long career that spans nearly seven decades. Although his last full time position was in 1994, when he was a consultant to the Algerian government working out of its Bechtel office in London, he has remained active in the field. He presented a paper entitled: 'Development of a gas condensate field from well head to tanker' at the University of Liverpool in 2006. Gonsalves studied marine engineering before heading to sea to put his knowledge to practice. "In those days you studied engineering and then you practised it," he says. After a period at sea, Gonsalves joined Taylor Woodrow, a London based construction firm. "It just so happened that the chairman of Taylor Woodrow at that time was president of the Institute of Civil Engineers and he said that anyone who dealt with concrete should not just know that it is a grey coloured material but understand its properties. So he sponsored me to go to Imperial College." As a result, Gonsalves not only became a member of The Institution of Civil Engineers, but also of The Institute of Marine Engineering and The Institute of Petroleum Engineering. "From the beginning I decided I would become a multi-disciplinary engineer," he says. "Although, my career emphasis has been more on mechanical aspects of engineering than civil related disciplines." This multi-discipline approach was perhaps not the quickest, and certainly these days, engineers often achieve chartered in much shorter periods. But Gonsalves explains that this can often not give people enough time to develop properly in to the discipline. "I did not become a real engineer for 12 years," he says. "This was until I had made my mistakes and fully learned from them. Young engineers in project management roles today need to remain diligent and should not be too ambitious too early. They should not aim too high until they have fully gained the sufficient knowledge and experience to know the instructions they are giving really will work." One of Gonsalves most challenging projects that involved him having to put all his experience and engineering nous to the test was when he was tasked with building a gas transmission line along the side of the Tay Bridge from Wormit to Dundee. "Some six feet of expansion in the pipeline had to be allowed for" he says. "I was asked if I had allowed for wind induced vortices by an old engineer who was mindful of Tay Bridge disaster where Sir Thomas Bouch omitting to allow for the effects. "I also particularly remember the pipelines I designed for Shell and BP in Nigeria and designing the oil terminal, because it involved all the major engineering disciplines in one project." Despite his age, Gonsalves still consult for projects from time to time, mostly in the oil and gas sector. "I was offered £600 a day as a retainer a short while ago," he says. "I replied, 'there must be much younger people available?' But they said to me, 'have any of them got the experience you have?' Of course they didn't." Gonsalves says that older engineers have a big role to play in the development of the next generation of engineers. "There is a big role for older engineers to pass on the benefit of their experiences to younger engineers," he says. "Whatever the advances in engineering equipment, the basic parameters remain exactly the same." And he one of his biggest gripes with the profession is perhaps the most prevalent within the engineering fraternity. "Engineering in Britain needs to adopt the European approach to engineering professionalism," he says. "The man who fixes your fridge – no disrespect to the guy – is not by my definition an engineer."