Brent Meins is the chief engineer of Detecht, a company he co-founded in 2018 offering vibration monitoring and specialized instrumentation services for the blasting and construction industries.  He is a PhD candidate in explosives engineering at Missouri S&T and earned a BS and MS from New Mexico Tech in civil and mechanical engineering with focuses on structural dynamics.

Brent has been a member of ISEE since 2013 and has a total of 13 years of experience in the explosives and instrumentation fields, working at New Mexico Tech and Aimone-Martin Associates before starting Detecht.  He has worked on high-profile projects all over the United States including the Central Park Tower and 2^nd Ave Subway in NYC, underwater demolition of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, and the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment at Homestake Mine in South Dakota.

Brent has authored 14 publications since 2012, received the 2016 ISEE paper of the year award, and has been featured on the cover of the Journal of Explosives Engineering four times.  His areas of research include blast-induced structure strain, subsurface vibration propagation, pipeline deformation from blasting, underwater detonation pressures, and instrumentation best practices.  His research contributed to blasting vibration regulation changes in New York City.

Currently, he is involved in the Klamath River dam removal project, the Gross Dam expansion, and several other bridge, heavy civil, and residential construction projects throughout the western US and Hawaii.  Additionally, he is an instructor for the Advanced Explosives Disposal Training course given regularly by ATF for bomb techs.

What led you to pursue a career in explosives engineering?

I was graduating with my Bachelor’s in civil engineering and undecided about continuing in grad school or looking for a job when I saw a poster on the wall in the lecture hall at New Mexico Tech advertising a Master’s in explosives engineering.  It sounded interesting to me and I was able to use my structural dynamics experience to research blast effects for my thesis.

What aspects of explosives engineering are you most passionate about?

I love the research that I’m able to do in parallel to the contract work.  We sometimes get special opportunities to gather unique blast-induced data that I hope furthers the scientific knowledge of the explosives community as a whole.

How has being a member of ISEE benefited your professional development individually and as a team?

ISEE has been great for meeting peers in our industry and keeping current on the newest tech for explosives applications.  The conferences have allowed me to present research and find others with similar interests, leading to successful collaborations.

Can you share a memorable ISEE experience that stands for you?

Partying at the Alamo is near the top memory, but my favorite is getting the Paper of the Year award even though that meant that my mentor, Dr. Cathy, and I had to give our talk to the entire conference and I was so nervous I had a hard time speaking in the beginning.

What’s one piece of advice you would give to individuals considering a career in explosives?

When I was racing on sailboats during high school and college, I would learn my job as part of the race team on one boat very well.  The red line did this, I needed to pull it exactly at this time.  But it wasn’t until I sailed on a few different boats that I gained a deeper understanding of sailing mechanics beyond my one job.  The halyard wasn’t always the red rope and different crews had different signals, timing, and tactics.  The same is true as a professional in explosives engineering.  By performing a small part of each project, the vibration monitoring, I’ve been able to travel around to many different projects across the US and see how different GC’s operate, observe varied blast crews, and take note of blast design decisions in a wide range of on-site conditions.

I would say to someone new in the industry to try some different jobs, companies, or just roles within your group to better understand blasting applications as whole and know what others are considering when doing their job.  Get to know people at the ISEE conference who do your job, go to talks pertinent to your skill area, and ask why they chose to do something different from your regular methods.  Don’t be afraid to ask lots of questions and learn!