Isambard Kingdom Brunel Brunel's achievements as an engineer. The 2013 album "The Last Ship" by Sting includes the song "Ballad of the Great Eastern". Isambard Kingdom Brunel Isambard Kingdom Brunel (; 9 April 1806 – 15 September 1859), was an English mechanical and civil engineer who is considered "one of the most ingenious and prolific figures in engineering history", "one of the 19th-century engineering giants", and "one of the greatest figures of the Industrial Revolution, [who] changed the face of the English landscape with his groundbreaking designs and ingenious constructions". Brunel built dockyards, the Great Western Railway, a series of steamships including the
Isambard Kingdom Brunel were not always successful, they often contained innovative solutions to long-standing engineering problems. During his career, Brunel achieved many engineering firsts, including assisting in the building of the first tunnel under a navigable river and development of , the first propeller-driven, ocean-going, iron ship, which, when built in 1843, was the largest ship ever built. Brunel set the standard for a well-built railway, using careful surveys to minimise gradients and curves. This necessitated expensive construction techniques, new bridges, new viaducts, and the long Box Tunnel. One controversial feature was the wide gauge, a "broad gauge" of , instead of what