18th Anniversary of the inauguration of the "Charilaos Trikoupis" Bridge

Εxit to the light with the woman as protagonist

Greece’s "National Bridge", inaugurated on August 12, 2004, celebrates its 18th birthday with a symbolic video.

It shows Ms. Maria Kitsou, a young engineer of GEFYRA’s structural maintenance department, climbing inside a pylon, changing levels from the foundations at the bottom of the sea to the top of the pylon where she exits to daylight, while at the same time the years that have passed since the bridge was opened to traffic are added up.

As she says, conveying in general the common concern of all departments for the conditions of excellence in the maintenance and operation of the infrastructure, "The daily work on the Bridge translates into the application of rules bequeathed to us by the expertise in maintenance and the technical knowledge acquired from the experience of our team over time. These are summarized in three concepts:  High quality - employees’ safety & environmental protection. But especially for a young female engineer, working on a project like the Bridge is an excellent opportunity for professional advancement in equality conditions, in a company that -since the construction period of the Bridge- has offered opportunities to many women and still continues to do so.”

Maria Kitsou

Ms. Kitsou graduated from the Department of Civil Engineering of the University of Patras in 2016. Alongside her undergraduate studies, she participated in the student internship program. In 2018, she obtained her Master's degree in "Structural Design and Analysis of Structures" from the School of Civil Engineering of the National Technical University of Athens. Since March 2019, she participates in the Structural Monitoring team of the Rion-Antirion Bridge "Charilaos Trikoupis", having as main task the collection and processing of data through the structural monitoring instrumentation system, the maintenance of the system and the participation in the design of temporary structures necessary for the maintenance of the Bridge and its equipment.

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