As promised on Saturday, here are some of the completed MTU Snow Statues. Paul and Nathalie Brandes (alias Capt. Paul and Dr. Nat) take us on a mini-tour of a few of the engineering works of art, starting with the TKE statue depicting Washington, DC. I recognized the Washington Monument there right away.

The next statue is the Delta Epsion creation of Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming, which took 3rd place. Recall the theme for this year's Winter Carnival is: As snow accumulates at alarming rates, we show our love for the fifty states, so this one shows the Park blown over in snow.

Spread your wings and fly away - Welcome to the USA was the next stop. I'm not clear on whose statue this one is, but it looks like there are several well known landmarks around the U.S. depicted here.

The remaining photos are of the 1st place statue and seeing some of the detail a bit closer in the photos, you can see why it is the winner. The Phi Kappa Tau statue takes you to New York, where you see a number of the famous landmarks there, including the Brooklyn Bridge, the Statue of Liberty, the Empire State Building, just to name a few. It's pretty creative the way they built some of the more intricate details from clear ice, like the crown and torch of Lady Liberty and the chain and ship's steering wheel in the front of the statue.

Every year the engineering students here at Michigan Tech build these amazing creations that show off some of the skills they're learning about engineering and they never cease to "wow" us all with those skills!

Exquisite...thanks for pix!

The statues are always impressive and this year doesn't disappoint. Capt. Paul and Dr. Nat's pictures really show off the detail.

Has the use of the clear frozen ice details become more common in recent years? It just doesn't seem like they were used as much a couple decades ago.

Great work by all involved!

Beautifully done.

The photos, as good as they are, do not do the Phi Kapp statue any justice at all! It was truly amazing to stand at the helm of the ship and imagine an immigrant coming across from Europe and to be greeted by the spectacle that is New York.

I believe that with time, the students have become masters of creating the clear ice, jbuck. I remember building statues 20+ years and while we had some clear ice, the amount now does seem to be more. Fortunately, I know how they do it and it's not as hard as you might think.

We are now back in Houston (reluctantly) but we had a magical time up there the past five days. On the plane flight back, Nat was already asking "how many days until next year's Winter Carnival?" I guess that means we'll be back next year.....

An astute observation, Capt. It seems that the older one gets, the more one appreciates the beauty that has been in front of us all along.
...and yes, these are great photos, especially for those of us who can't be there. ;-)

gorgeous!!!

Absolutely beautiful. We went today to
try to capture the beauty, but they were
somewhat snow covered and just not as
gorgeous as you know they were.

They've been doing winter carnival at the
University of Minnesota with clear ice for
quite some time now. I have to say that
I've always been biased toward Tech's
statues because they were snow and I just
liked them better. However, these are
beautiful and I just love the New York
one. Stunning!

Thank you for taking us there since we got
up there just a little too late.

I can see why Phi Kappa Tau won 1st - amazing detail and a lot of work in that sculpture!!
Thanks for the tour Capt. Paul & Nat!!
It looks like it was the perfect day to view - blue skies & sunshine!