Engineer's Day in Chile Date in the current year: May 14, 2024

Chilean engineers have to say “thank you” to the College of Engineers for existence of this professional holiday, because it's totally responsible for it. In 2008 the executive committee of the College was asked, if there was a special holiday honoring a very important profession of engineers. Since there was not a single day, the committee was given a task to find a special event in the history or Chile, that could praise the work of engineers. And this event was found.

On May 13, 1647 a devastating earthquake, similar to the earthquake on February 27, 2010, hit the most populated area of Chile and destroyed almost all buildings, that couldn't resist the disaster of this power. Many people were killed, but the next day all survivors of the earthquakes started removing the remnants of the buildings to find their relatives and rebuild the country. This was the primary reason, why May 14 was chosen to be Engineer's Day.

The inaugural celebration of this holiday was rather extraordinary for the country. The festive events were organized in many countries. Several universities held solemn ceremonies and educative lectures about the importance of engineering.