Sustainable University

Structural engineer in Zambia: honey, fires, and house made of clay

At the beginning of July 2025, Ondřej Lokos, a doctoral student at the Faculty of Civil Engineering at BUT, set out for Zambia. In the Kashitu area, a high school campus has been growing for the third year now, and since this February Ondřej has been working on the project as a structural engineer. The task for this season was clear and beautifully concrete: to build a honey bottling plant – a beekeeping laboratory that connects teaching with local practice. In the following text, he shares his experiences.

First sip of Zambia: a highway where the steering wheel comes off in your hands

The journey from the capital Lusaka to Kapiri Mposhi is an initiation ritual. The highway has just one lane in each direction, yet you may easily encounter two trucks side by side coming towards you, forcing you into a half-ditch maneuver. At one point, our driver literally ended up holding the steering wheel in his hands – and yet we made it. In Kashitu we jumped straight into reality: unloading a truck full of timber at midnight, used first for formwork and later for trusses. The very next day I set off to Ndola for materials with the instruction “be back by lunch at the latest.” It didn’t work out. A flat tire on the car, demanding markets and Indian shops, and finally the explosion of our truck’s tire under the weight of the load on that so-called “safe” highway. This was followed by improvised reloading of all the material into another truck and returning shortly after midnight. Zambia really does not present itself in small sips.

How construction works in Kashitu

On the third day I was already on site, where the finished foundation strips awaited us, and we began preparing the formwork for the leveling concrete slab. The bottling plant itself is built of unfired bricks, which the locals produce near the construction site. The project’s chief architect, Václav Centner, would call the rib-reinforced perimeter walls a “rhythmic façade” – and aptly so: the regular order of bricks creates a sculptural play of shadows. Beneath the windowsills are vents, also seen in warehouses, where they are shaped like mathematical “greater than” signs, providing natural ventilation and playful light effects. The roof is designed with wooden trusses and basilica-style lighting, and under the sheet-metal covering lie clay tiles that serve as a simple acoustic and thermal insert. The materials are modest, available, and meaningful: whatever can be produced and repaired locally is what gets used.

The structural engineer as site supervisor

My main mission on the site was to oversee the masonry itself. The only civilized aid I had was a level and my eye. Compared to previous years, we introduced stricter rules: a 12 mm mortar joint and a 2 mm tolerance in the masonry. The beginnings were painful for everyone involved – we tore down freshly built sections, went back a step, and explained why it was worth caring about millimeters even here. The greater joy came when, toward the end of my stay, the locals themselves started asking for checks and monitoring precision as if it were their own concern. I consider this the greatest transferable value that will remain on the site even when I am thousands of kilometers away.

Zambian time and the burning horizon

“Any minute now.” – a sentence you’ll hear daily. It can mean an hour, or just as well a few days. After a few days you catch yourself changing your perspective instead of getting upset: less stress, more focus on what can be influenced. Toward the end of my stay, several places in the area were burning and the flames were higher than the local houses. I stood calmly and, through the viewfinder of my camera, enjoyed the sight of the orange horizon. Zambia teaches patience and humility. And by the way – no tropics. It’s a dry winter. At night, temperatures dropped to 3 °C, usually stayed between 8–10 °C, and during the day around 18–20 °C.

Construction milestones 2025

Toward the end of my stay we had completed the foundation strips and prepared the leveling slab. The masonry steadily rose and, thanks to continuous checks, maintained the required accuracy. Before leaving, we cast the reinforced concrete ring beam, and timber for the roof trusses was ready at the sawmill. On paper it sounds like “another phase completed,” but in reality, it was mainly a shift in the team: routine turned into work with a focus on quality.

Why it all makes sense

The campus in Kashitu is not a one-off construction, but a long-term effort that grows not only in walls, but mainly in people: in craft, discipline, and responsibility. The honey bottling plant will add a practical dimension to the campus – connecting education with the local economy and helping the school one day stand on its own feet. That’s the magic of simple solutions: they don’t need complex technologies, only patience, precision, and attention to detail.

In conclusion

I left at a time when the reinforced concrete ring beam was curing on the masonry and the timber for the roof awaited installation. What stayed in my mind was the darkness under a starry arch, the distant thud of clay tiles, and above all, the team without which the project would make no sense. Zambia humbled me and taught me a lot.

For those who want to know more, information about the project can be found at www.kashituschool.org.

Source: Faculty of Civil Engineering, BUT