Dedication
Ing. Alain Štěrba,
was born in a family of civil engineers on March 10th, 1924. His education started at a French High School in Prague. After the school was forcefully closed due to the occupation of the country in 1939, he finished his secondary education at High School in Prague. He continued at the Faculty of Civil Engineering at the Technical University in Prague where he graduated with honours. During his studies he started gaining his first practical experience in at those times private companies, e.g. Lanna or Hlava.. After nationalization of private enterprises in 1950, Alain worked as a construction manager and technologist, e.g. in Vodotechna – reservoirs and water tanks construction or Posista – airport constructions, etc..
Alain was systematically adding further knowledge to his education, esp. in fields connected to new and developing technologies. His interest enhanced his already deep knowledge of maths, physics, chemistry, statistics and many other fields. “Armed” as he was, he was logically predestined for wide research activity and of course his focuse was on new methodologies, especially in concrete technology. He was involved in numerous research and developing companies. Of his many realized research works I would like to pick up research and development of prestressed concrete tubes, construction elements technology, testing methods and their assessment. Ing. Alain Štěrba has contributed significantly to development of precast concrete technology and together with this, also to technology of concrete precast elements for housing and engineering construction. Alain also strongly influenced plans, technology and manufacturing of concrete framework when the Prague subway was being constructed. He participated in solving numerous state research tasks, where he cooperated with universities, Czech Academy of Science institutions, The Building and Architectural Institute in Bratislava, Institute of Engeneering Constructions, Institutes of Construction Materilas and many others.
Since 1983 he was a member of a Committee for Technical Standards in the Field of Concrete Constructions and Technologies. As a leading expert he took part in the works of creating and amendments to Czech Concrete standards. After 1989, when the research base in the concrete construction field practically ceased to exist, Alain Štěrba continued his work at a private company of Loudin & comp. Ltd. He focused on creating recepies for concrete, higher efficiency in concrete production with the aid of new additives and admixtures and verifying their physical features.
Alain actively participated in launching new technical standards, e.g. ČSN EN 206-1 Concrete – specifications, features, compliance.
After several years of effortless cooperation with major concrete manufacturers (esp. ZAPA beton a.s.), Alain created MULTIBET - a computer SW for concrete recipe design while optimizing the material costs. This program has been used in numbers of concrete manufactures. He then developed UNIBET I – a universal program of concrete recipe design for wide use and UNIBET II – that has been used by many experts in the Czech and Slovak Republic.
Alain Štěrba cooperated with top expert institutions and schools – Faculty of Civil Engineering of the Czech Technical University, Faculty of Civil Engineering of the Technical University in Brno, Readymix Concrete Producers Association of the Czech Republic and the Czech Concrete Society – where he is an Honorary Member. Thanks to his expert knowledge of French, German, English and Russian he studied related foreign trends and by publishing what he learnt Alain contributed to the concrete business in the Czech Republic.
Alain Štěrba left us on January 27, 2022 at the age of nearly 98.