Robert Ratay

Robert Ratay, Ph.D., P.E., is a structural engineer in private practice in New York with more than 40 years of design, construction, and teaching experience, and an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University. His current practice and teaching are focused on the investigation and litigation support of structural and construction failures. Dr. Ratay has been an expert consultant/witness for engineers, contractors, owners, attorneys, and insurance companies in the investigation and litigation...See more

Robert Ratay, Ph.D., P.E., is a structural engineer in private practice in New York with more than 40 years of design, construction, and teaching experience, and an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University. His current practice and teaching are focused on the investigation and litigation support of structural and construction failures. Dr. Ratay has been an expert consultant/witness for engineers, contractors, owners, attorneys, and insurance companies in the investigation and litigation support of nearly 100 cases of temporary structure and other construction failures. Earlier in his career he had worked with such prominent engineering firms as Le Messurier Associates, Severud Associates, and HNTB, and had been Professor and Chairman of the Civil Engineering Department, then Dean of the School of Engineering at Pratt Institute, and a Professor at Polytechnic University (formerly Brooklyn Polytech). Dr. Ratay has lectured extensively at conferences and seminars and published in U.S. and international journals on temporary structures in construction. He is the Editor-in-Chief of two other books: Structural Condition Assessment and Forensic Structural Engineering Handbook , Second Edition, published in 2005 and 2010, respectively. Dr. Ratay has served on and chaired several technical committees, was a member of the advisory committee of the Federal Highway Administration to tighten regulations for temporary structures, and is the originator and chairman of the SEI/ASCE 37, Design Loads on Structures during Construction Standard Committee. In 2003, he was named by Engineering News-Record as one of the "Top Newsmakers 2003" who made a mark in the construction industry; in 2011 he was named by Structural Engineer magazine as one of the "Power List" of ten "individuals who bring progress and passion to the structural engineering field." Dr. Ratay is a Life Member and Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), and a Fellow of the International Association of Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE). See less