Golden Gate Bridge wanted it to be painted with black and yellow stripes to ensure visibility by passing ships. Senior engineer Charles Alton Ellis, collaborating remotely with Moisseiff, was the principal engineer of the project. Moisseiff produced the basic structural design, introducing his "deflection theory" by which a thin, flexible roadway would flex in the wind, greatly reducing stress by transmitting forces via suspension cables to the bridge towers. Although the Golden Gate Bridge design has proved sound, a later Moisseiff design, the original Tacoma Narrows Bridge, collapsed in a strong windstorm soon after it was completed, because of an unexpected aeroelastic flutter.
Suicides at the Golden Gate Bridge having let go of the rope. Retired UCSF professor of psychiatry Jerome Motto stated that Alarab might have been disturbed by the outbreak of the war and "that previously bearable pain suddenly became intolerable". On May 11, 2004, Gene Sprague, a native of San Mateo, California, committed suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. His death is documented in the 2006 film "The Bridge". During the filming of "The Bridge", the crew noticed Sprague walking back and forth along the bridge for around 90 minutes, before stopping to lean over the railing. According to Eric Steel, the film's director,