Member Spotlight - Viviana Carta
Viviana Carta is a Senior Naval Architect in the Docking & Stability department at Devonport Royal Dockyard Ltd (Babcock), providing life support to the UK Royal Navy assets. She holds a master's degree in Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering from the University of Genoa and a MSc in Advanced Mechanical Engineering from Cranfield University.
She started her career in 2016 at BPP-Tech Ltd, a London-based engineering consultancy company providing services to the offshore energy market. She then moved to Longitude Engineering Lt
d, part of ABL Group, where she joined the Structure and Stability team, eventually becoming the stability lead. During this time, she acted as Inclining Officer on different types of vessels with length ranging 70-150m.
Currently, Viviana is the Secretary and Webmaster of the SNAME Western Europe Section (WES). Since 2020 she has been organizing the annual SNAME WES Paper Contest open to students and young professionals. She participated in the same contest in 2018 with a paper entitled “ShipShell: a design tool for all-steel and SPS shell openings”. The paper was based on her MSc dissertation on the Sandwich Plate System (SPS), a study carried out in collaboration with SPS Technology Ltd.
Questions:
1. At what point in your career did you join SNAME?
I joined the Western Europe Section (WES) in 2017, about a year after I started my first job in London.
2. How has SNAME membership been of value to you in your career?
I regularly attend the Symposia, and the section meetings organized by WES and other sections too – this allows me to keep up to date with the wider industry and be introduced to subjects that I would not normally see in my day-to-day job. Networking events are always a good opportunity to meet people while visiting interesting venues. Getting involved in the committee has also allowed me to experience firsthand how a professional society is run.
3. When did you know you wanted to pursue a job in the maritime field?
I have wanted to be an engineer since I was a kid but when applying to university, I could not really choose which field (civil, electrical, mechanical). Naval architecture had it all and sounded like a challenge, so I decided to embark on it.
4. What advice would you give to those entering the maritime field?
Not easy to generalize but I think the following applies to most cases: build a strong foundation to start with and then keep learning as much as you can, by yourself and from others, from all the positions you will find yourself in. Be reliable and thorough in your work.
5. What do you do in your spare time?
I enjoy playing the violin, tenor recorder and piano.
6. What is your favorite book, movie or tv series?
Lord of the Rings, Nuovo Cinema Paradiso
7. What is a fun fact about yourself?!
Until about 2 years old, I was terrified of the sea!