For the second year in a row, Wilmington-based Andrew Consulting Engineers has been honored for its structural engineering work by the Structural Engineers Association of North Carolina (SEA of NC), according to a news release.

SEA of NC presented Andrew Consulting Engineers with the 2017 Award for Excellence in Structural Engineering in the Historic Preservation category for its work to restore the 140-year-old Bell Tower at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church at 601 Grace St. in Wilmington.

The award was presented at its state conference in October. SEA of NC was established in 2009 and is dedicated to improving the practice, educational standards and pubic understanding of structural engineering, officials said in the release.

E.B. Pannkuk, principal engineer with Andrew Consulting Engineers, was the project manager and structural engineer of record on the Bell Tower project.

“We are honored by this award and for the opportunity to restore such a significant part of our community’s history,” Pannkuk said in the release. “The restoration presented a variety of challenges due to its age and design and we’re very pleased that our engineering solutions enabled us to save the historic brick and retain the structure’s architectural integrity.”

St. Mark’s Episcopal Church was founded in 1869 and was the first African-American Episcopal church in eastern North Carolina. Construction of the church and bell tower began in 1871 and was completed in 1874.

The bell tower (right) at St. Mark’s consists of a 30-foot tall plaster coated steeple sitting atop a 40-foot tall masonry tower. During cosmetic repairs to the exterior plaster of the bell tower, a contractor discovered that the underlying brick was retaining water.

Andrew Consulting Engineers was hired to conduct a survey of the structure and found that the steeple’s waterproofing had failed and that long-term exposure to water had softened the bricks to the point that the tower was no longer structurally sound. Its engineers further determined that the original brick was most likely not fired correctly in the kiln, which compromised its structural integrity even further.

According to Pannkuk, he and his team developed a repair design that included the use of a masonry hardener compound that would restore the brick’s strength without requiring the removal or replacement of any of the historic brick.

They also designed a repair for the structural timber supporting the bell that precisely matched the original construction details, officials said in the release. At the completion of the project, the bell was operational. The structural repair cost for the project was $70,000 and the construction cost was about $120,000.

The year 2016 was the first year that SEA of NC presented awards. In 2016, SEA of NC honored Andrew Consulting Engineers for its work on the Wilson Center at Cape Fear Community College.