Gary Sweatt, P. E. has 40 years experience with all facets of wood building design and construction with a career emphasis on metal plate connected wood trusses. He was the Chief Engineer for Trussway for 24 years and during his tenure Trussway was the largest MPC wood truss manufacturer in the US. Gary also served as the Chair of the WTCA Engineering Review Committee and is recognized as a national leader in the field of MPC wood truss design, manufacturing, and applications. He now works as an independent Structural Engineer focusing on wood building investigations and repairs. Gary is a "hands-on" engineer preferring to be in the field working on new or existing constructions. Over the span of his career, he has provided literally tens-of- thousands of repair drawings for trusses on projects. His strengths include solving field problems, preparing repair drawings, and forensic work on major collapses.

Frank Woeste, P.E., Ph.D., is a wood construction and engineering consultant. Frank conducted wood engineering research and taught wood design courses throughout his 26-year tenure at Virginia Tech. He recently published papers on the design of wood joist systems supporting ceramic tile and considerations for safe and durable coastal deck construction. Frank is responsible for Wood Bits, a column on practical design information for wood construction in the ICC magazine Building Safety Journal (www.iccsafe.org/news/bsj/). His consulting experience is broad, ranging from an international investigation of a permanent bracing failure of an in-service roof truss system to the failure of residential deck components. A list of his publications can be viewed at: www.woodscience.vt.edu/resumes/woeste1101.pdf