Coronavirus: Engineers Help 'Shield' South Shore Hospital Staff

WEYMOUTH, MA – A thin, clear sheet of plastic, a strip of foam padding, a piece of two-sided tape and a slice of Velcro could be a life-saver in the emergency room during the new coronavirus pandemic.

Three Massachusetts engineers are looking for ways to make 10,000 life-savers for front-line hospital workers in the state as part of "The Shield Team."

That's what Jeffrey Diep, David Kindler and Ngoc Tran are calling their efforts to make protective face shields to be distributed through South Shore Hospital. Diep, a mechanical engineer from Quincy, said the trio dropped off the first 600 shields to the Weymouth hospital on Monday with the hope to have 500 more done by the end of the week.

The goal is then to secure funding and manufacturing support for up to 10 times that amount of masks that will help protect doctors and nurses from contagious COVID-19 droplets.

"I heard a report on the radio that there was a (personal protection equipment) shortage and people we scrambling," Diep said. "I thought to myself that I grew up with this material. I can help. I can design these things."

Diep said the emphasis was turning them around quickly to get them to the front-line medical workers while the pandemic is at its peak in the state.

"When I approached one place about making them they said they would take about three weeks," Diep said. "Three weeks? They don't have three weeks. We had to come up with something now."

Diep shared his thoughts with Kindler, a mechanical engineer from Concord, and Tran, a process engineer from Worcester, and together they came up with four relative simple, low-cost models that Diep said he brought to South Shore Hospital for inspection.

"They asked a lot of questions and passed them around to the staff," Diep said. "One of the things they said was they needed the foam, so we added the foam. Then they tried it out and they loved it."

Diep said he then asked how many of the masks were wanted.

"She said they have to aim high," he recalled. "She told me 10,000."

That sent Diep's head spinning.

"I didn't expect that type of a number," he said. "I told them that I don't know if we had the resources. We were thinking more like 1,000. How can we get there?"

The engineers began a GoFundMe page with a goal of $1,100 on April 13 that was exceeded within days with the help of some support from a news segment on CBS Boston that aired over the weekend.

"Everything took off from there," Diep said. "It's been unbelievable. I was getting so many messages that at one point I couldn't keep up with them anymore. I was getting more emails than I could reply to."

Diep said they are now exploring options that will allow them to ramp up production beyond what they can do in their houses. He said he is looking to find a way to get the materials in bulk supply after initially going from Lowe's to Lowe's in Eastern Mass.

He said that bought piecemeal the raw materials add up to about $1 per mask.

Diep added that, despite the mask's simplicity, it will last "a few weeks" and can be washed and sanitized. It is also easy to get one and off with limited adjustments.

"We do understand this is a very challenging time for all of us but if we are united we will pull through and win this war," The Shield Team posted as their objective on their GoFundMe page. "For those of us still can, please support us so we can provide the tool to those at the front line, who are sacrificing, defending, protecting us from COVID-19."

(If you have a story of a local business or organization that is looking to lend a hand to those in need during the new coronavirus pandemic,or lift spirits amid social distancing and isolation, Patch wants to let people in your community know about it. Contact Scott Souza at Scott.Souza@patch.com to help us spread the positives during this uncertain time.)

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