I don’t know how many people have told me they saw the Fountains of Bellagio and cried. Cried! That’s not something people often tell engineers about their work,” Tony Freitas, P.E. says of the $75 million Las Vegas fountain he helped design. Freitas, who has a B.S. in mechanical engineering, is Manager of Architecture and Facility Engineering for WET Design, the company regarded by many as the most creative and innovative fountain design firm in the world.
What brings about the tears? Imagine taking 1200 water jets (many of them motorized and synchronized) and more than 5400 individually programmed underwater lights and choreographing them all to the music of Luciano Pavarotti, Aaron Copland, Frank Sinatra and others. People cry because the Fountains of Bellagio are not just an engineering masterpiece or a work of art on a grand scale; it is because the fountains seem to be alive, with a heart, soul and emotions of their very own. It is something from which Mark Fuller derives tremendous personal satisfaction.