The most-talked-about event of National Engineers Week at Walla Walla University, Feb. 17–23, 2019, was the 39th annual Egg Drop competition sponsored by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) club. The yearly event features contestants including WWU engineering students and students from Davis Elementary School. Competitors design devices to protect a single raw egg from destruction when it is dropped from the roof of Kretschmar Hall to a frying pan waiting on the ground below.
Entries are evaluated in two areas: whether or not the egg is intact after impact and the proximity of the egg to the frying pan target. This year there were 39 entries, 17 of which came from the sophomore engineering mechanics class and the rest were elementary students from Davis Elementary School.
Team “R.I.P. Opportunity” — comprised of WWU engineering students Ethan Dolph, Matthew Harter, Andrew Eoff and Ivan Wu — won first place and $100, provided by Key Technology, in the college student category.
“Our apparatus is essentially a rocket-looking cushion for the egg. The approach to the design was to have the rocket land head first to extend the impact time of the device. In other words, we wanted there to be as much cushion as possible for the egg at the bottom,” Wu says.
Other awards given included Most Creative, Best Engineered and Humpty Dumpty — for the most spectacular or entertaining fail.
The ASME club at WWU exists to connect the scientific and social aspects of engineering in an engaging and informative way and to build connections among engineers by hosting events like the Egg Drop to engage the community and campus.
To learn more about how you can solve probelms through engineering, visit www.wallawalla.edu/engineering.
The winning apparatus was designed and built by WWU engineering students on team R.I.P. Opportunity.
