EERI and Mexican Society for Earthquake Engineering Sign Cooperative Agreement

Transcription

1 EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH INSTITUTE NEWSLETTER Editor Associate Editors Editorial Assistant Thalia Anagnos Sarah Nathe Gerald Brady Eloise Gilland Earthquake Engineering Research Institute th Street, Suite 320 Oakland, California Phone: 510/ Fax: 510/ Web site: ISSN Reproduction with attribution is permitted. EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH INSTITUTE PRESIDENT Chris D. Poland PRESIDENT-ELECT Thomas D. O Rourke VICE PRESIDENT Svetlana Brzev SECRETARY-TREASURER Ronald L. Mayes BOARD OF DIRECTORS Sergio M. Alcocer Donald Ballantyne Svetlana Brzev Mary C. Comerio Melvyn Green Ronald L. Mayes Dennis Mileti Thomas D. O Rourke Chris D. Poland EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Susan K. Tubbesing News of the Institute EERI and Mexican Society for Earthquake Engineering Sign Cooperative Agreement On November 30 in Cuernavaca, Mexico, EERI President Chris Poland joined Francisco José Sánchez Sesma, president of the Sociedad Mexicana de Ingenieria Sismica (SMIS), to sign a cooperative agreement between the two organizations. EERI members Vit Bertero and Luis Esteva (current president of the International Association of Earthquake Engineering) also participated in signing the agreement. The purpose of the cooperative agreement is to promote and sponsor collaboration, with the goal of participating jointly in scientific and technical activities in areas of common interest related to earthquake engineering. In order to achieve the objective of the agreement, EERI and SMIS agreed to develop an agenda of common problems and areas of opportunity in earthquake engineering, exchange and translate selected publications and other information, develop joint publications and information on mitigation measures, carry out joint research programs, organize seminars and conferences, develop exchange programs for professional events, encourage the organization of and participation in technical committees, promote the participation of social scientists from both countries in the development of earthquake mitigation policies. In order carry out the ambitious goals of the agreement, EERI and SMIS are establishing a bilateral commission to develop programs, evaluate their progress and effectiveness, and exchange information continuously on the development of policies and procedures. This commission will meet for the first time at the EERI Annual Meeting. The signing of the cooperative agreement by Poland (center) and Sánchez Sesma (second from right). (photo courtesy of Sergio Alcocer) Last Call: 55th Annual Meeting Tackles Risk Reduction Challenges Beginning on the evening of Wednesday, February 5, many of the nation s leading earthquake professionals, along with students, government officials, and seismic safety advocates will gather for three days at EERI s 55th Annual Meeting. The theme is Challenges for Policies and Programs in Regions of Infrequent Earthquakes. More than 20 speakers will survey research, past and present public policy efforts, and ideas to keep improving seismic safety in the years to come. An important highlight of the meeting will be the first presentation of the 2003 Distinguished Lecture by William Petak on Implementing Earthquake Mitigation: The Context Counts. The meeting will offer both regional and national perspectives. It will examine continued on page 3 1

2 News of the Institute Housing Project Seeks Editors The World Housing Encyclopedia, the EERI/IAEE project to link engineers, architects, and builders around the world in sharing knowledge about housing construction design and practice, now is making the transition from an Endowment Fund project to an ongoing EERI activity. The encyclopedia web site www. world-housing.net includes over 80 contributions from 30 countries with more than 180 participants. The initial project steering committee members have completed their three-year terms. In the future, the ongoing management of the project will be undertaken by an editorial board to be appointed in February. The steering committee is seeking applications for five key positions in the project: chief editor, and editors for each of the following four regions: Europe, Asia, North America and Oceania combined, and South America. The chief editor will have overall managerial responsibility for the project, helping to identify future directions and weaknesses of the current web site and collaborating with the regional editors, EERI staff, and web development team. The regional editors will be responsible for identifying typical construction types from various countries in their regions that are missing from the encyclopedia, and for identifying engineers and architects who would be interested in contributing information on the types. The committee anticipates that another 80 contributions will be needed to complete the encyclopedia. The editors will also be responsible for identifying technical reviewers for new contributions, and for ensuring that communication takes place between their authors and reviewers. The editors will perform the final review of the contributions before they are posted. These volunteer positions will have three-year terms. Most projectrelated tasks will be accomplished by and online editing. Travel expenses will be reimbursed to attend one meeting per year to discuss the project s progress. Volunteers wishing to be considered for an editorial appointment should send an message to Marjorie Greene at mgreene@eeri.org by February 15, 2003, describing their experience and position of interest. IT Committee s New Initiative EERI s Information Technology Committee is currently drafting a proposal to submit to the NSF Information Technology Research (ITR) Program. This year, the program intends to fund proposals that address the continued expansion and utili zation of information technology across the sciences and engineering. It is the last year of the program; the anticipated funding is approximately $145 million. Giant steps taken in the evolution of technology provide an unprecedented opportunity for postearthquake reconnaissance and data collection. The proposal s aim is to create a portable earthquake clearinghouse by determining standards and protocols for earthquake reconnaissance data collection, and by determining hardware and software requirements to establish a rapid, reliable, and robust data collection system. The proposal will have a heavy emphasis on the role of technology and the links between IT and earthquake engineering. 2 An advisory committee has been established to help frame the tasks in the proposal and to identify appropriate roles for members, universities, and private sector firms. Committee members include Dan Abrams of the Mid-America Earthquake Center, Greg Fenves of the Pacific Earthquake Engineering Research Center, Andrei Reinhorn of the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research, and EERI President-Elect Tom O Rourke. Members of the IT Committee participating in the proposalwriting effort include Patricia Grossi, Nesrin Basoz, and Joshua Marrow. The proposal is due at the ITR Program on February 12. Any members interested in learning more details about the proposal should contact IT Committee member Patricia Grossi (pgrossi@mail.cox.smu. edu). Further information on the proposal will be available on the EERI web site, Announcement Social Science Research Training Fellowships Applications are being solicited from junior faculty for a unique research training program aimed at fostering the next generation of social scientists addressing societal aspects of natural hazards and extreme events. Entitled Enabling the Next Generation of Hazard Researchers, this program, funded by the National Science Foundation, is being undertaken by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in collaboration with faculty from seven other universities. The program consists of a two-year series of workshops, tutorials, and discussions focusing on social science research initiation and proposal development for addressing hazards and extreme events. Participants will receive an honorarium and travel expenses to workshops and meetings with senior faculty mentors. The application deadline is March 1, For more details, visit curs/enabling/index.html or contact Leanna Hush (hush@ . unc.edu) or Raymond Burby (burby@ .unc.edu).

3 EERI Newsletter, January 2003 Volume 37, Number 1 News of the Institute Earthquake Spectra Online Update Five issues of Earthquake Spectra are now available online for the time period November 2001 through Statistics compiled monthly by the American Institute of Physics (AIP) indicate that usage of the online edition is increasing rapidly as new online issues become available. During the month of October 2002, nearly 1,400 articles were requested and more than 1,000 articles downloaded in PDF, HTML, or Gzipped PostScript format from the first four issues. This number of articles is expected to increase significantly once all of the back issues of the journal are available online. Members are encouraged to take advantage of the many new services provided by the online edition located at EarthquakeSpectra/. The new services, for which there are currently no charges, include viewing, downloading, and printing of full-text articles in one of three formats; extensive browse, search, and retrieval capabilities using the SPIN web database; and rapid linking of EQS references to those in 6,000+ other journals through CrossRef Distinguished Lecturer Nominations Annual Meeting continued from page 1 the Pacific Northwest s unique tectonic setting in the Cascadia subduction zone as well as improvements to public and corporate facilities in that region. The Friday night banquet speaker, Ruth Ludwin of the Pacific Northwest Seismograph Network, will discuss native stories about earthquakes that have occurred there. For a national viewpoint, representatives of the NEHRP agencies will delve into issues facing the earthquake community and federal agencies as they prepare for NEHRP reauthorization hearings in the second quarter of There will be two Saturday sessions on the George E. Brown, Jr. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation (NEES): the morning session will be a comprehensive consideration of its status and future; then in the afternoon immediately after the Annual Meeting, the NEES Consortium Development Team will facilitate a discussion of the possible roles for existing experimental facilities within the consortium. Representatives from laboratories that could be used to support the NEES mission are encouraged to attend. Last-minute additions to the Saturday program include brief reports from reconnaissance team members on the earthquakes in southern Italy (magnitude 5.9 on October 31) and on the Denali Fault in Alaska (7.9 on November 3). All EERI members should have received in the mail the program brochure containing the meeting registration form and hotel information. For your convenience, this Newsletter contains a registration form. Online registration is available at the web site Don t delay in making your reservation this Annual Meeting has something for everyone! Be sure to make your hotel reservations (800/ ) by January 7 to help ensure that EERI fills its room block. Subscribing members who are interested in exhibiting at the Annual Meeting should contact Sonya Hollenbeck (sonya@eeri.org) of the EERI staff. Young Members Social after Banquet All young members (under 35 years old), representing the future of EERI, are invited to meet for some social time at the hotel bar at 9:30 p.m., immediately following the Friday dinner banquet. After a brief no-host cocktail hour, the group will be off to experience Portland s night life at its finest. More information will be available at the Annual Meeting. For further information or to RSVP, please contact the YMF chair, Joshua Marrow, at jmmarrow@sgh.com. Since 1992, EERI has honored leaders in the earthquake profession through the annual Distinguished Lecturer Award. This lecture is always presented for the first time at the EERI Annual Meeting (see page 1), and then at a series of meetings nationwide. The Honors Committee will meet during the Annual Meeting in Portland, Oregon, to consider candidates for the Distinguished Lecturer Award for Please submit your written nominations to the Honors Committee, in care of the EERI office, by January 31. Japanese Garden in Portland (photo: Portland Oregon Visitors Association/ Larry Geddis) 3

4 News of the Institute Summary Minutes of the October 10, 2002 Meeting of the Board of Directors Preliminaries: President C. Poland called the meeting to order at 8:50 a.m. Present were President-Elect T. O Rourke, Secretary/Treasurer R. Mayes, Directors S. Alcocer, D. Ballantyne, S. Brzev, M. Comerio, and D. Mileti. Also present were S. Tubbesing, Executive Director, and V. Austin, Administrative Assistant. Director M. Green arrived at 9 a.m. C. Scawthorn, T. Tobin, and P. Yanev joined the meeting at a later point. President s Report: Conversations with Senator Diane Feinstein and California State Senator Ellen Corbett convinced Poland of the need to solicit broad support for the reauthorization of NEHRP. He suggested that a resolution should be prepared and sent to public agencies, Project Impact cities, universities involved in seismic safety studies, and other constituencies in an effort to demonstrate a groundswell of support. It is incumbent upon the professional community to speak and act. Secretary/Treasurer s Report: Mayes reviewed the Report of Revenue and Expenses as of August 31, The combined balance sheet showed an opening fund balance of $127,643, which was augmented by $253,419 in excess revenues over expenses. EERI s total liabilities of $134,768 combined with the total fund balance of $381,061 equaled $515,829. The Endowment Program s opening balance of $706,099 was decreased by $149,570 in expenses, for a total fund balance of $556,529. Total liabilities in the amount of $267,466 combined with the total fund balance of $556,529 equaled $823,995. The balance of the combined association, endowment, and technical programs equaled $1,339,825. The Investment Funds Report showed a balance of $215,938 in the General Administrative Short-Term Fund and $30,118 in the Long-Term Fund. The Endowment Fund balance totaled $556,529 and the Friedman Family Investment Fund totaled $103,766. The balance of the interest-bearing checking account was $76,063. The combined funds in both the general administrative checking and investment accounts totaled $323,953. The Grants Status Summary showed that of $4,216,644 in active grants, $559,520 has been expended, leaving a balance of $3,657,124 as of August 31, Mayes reported that revenue and expenses are on target, although revenues from the national conference were disappointing. The conference just broke even. To increase profitability in the future, the Board considered the pros and cons of holding national conferences in California and changing the venue only of Annual Meetings. The Board recognized that changing venues for the national conference helps attract researchers and promote chapter development, and agreed not to change procedures Budget: The Board reviewed a draft of the 2003 budget and agreed to defer approval until the December Board meeting so that the increased costs of the employee benefits package and of additional part-time staff could be more accurately stated in the budget. Publications Policy Issues: Tubbesing reported that F. Naeim had agreed to be the new editor of Spectra, and A. Reinhorn would serve as associate editor. The Board approved the new composition of the Editorial Board. 4 Possible Joint Activities with SSA: O Rourke informed the Board that he had talked with Gail Atkinson, president of SSA, who is interested in collaborating with EERI in presenting the Bill Joyner Memorial Lecture during future annual meetings. Collaboration on this will begin in Seattle Scenario: The Board affirmed that the intention in developing the Seattle scenario is to help other communities develop their own scenarios. The Endowment Committee and FEMA will contribute funds for the scenario and guidelines. Alcocer asked that consideration be given in the scenario to what can be done for data-poor countries. Housing Project Next Steps: O Rourke related that the Housing Encyclopedia web site has been very successful with up to 150 unique visitors per day. The Board reviewed a flow chart of the proposed new project management structure, which would enable the site to be managed with minimal impact upon JAMA and EERI staff operations. The current Project Management Committee, with the exception of the chair, will step down in January 2003, and the management structure will be reorganized (see article on page 2). Additional funding of approximately $50,000 to 100,000 will be needed to maintain and update the web site with new information every few years. Outside funding will be sought. 8NCEE: Yanev, Tobin, and Scawthorn proposed that EERI and the Northern California Chapter cooperate in planning the Quake 06 observance. The Board accepted the chapter s offer to host the 8NCEE and to incorporate Quake 06 and Annual Meeting activities into the conference. Poland agreed to chair the 8NCEE Committee, which will put in place an organizational structure by the December

5 Board meeting. Tobin is the chapter contact to the Board Annual Meeting: The Board approved the suggestion that the 2004 Annual Meeting be held in the Los Angeles area to capture the tenth anniversary of the Northridge earthquake. It will focus on new information that has been developed since the reconnaissance effort. International Activities Committee (IAC): Alcocer reviewed recommendations to establish objectives and recruitment strategies for promoting communication, cooperation, and collaboration between EERI and organizations and individuals in other nations. The Board endorsed the long-term objectives of the IAC and discussed how to prioritize and implement them. Recommendations from the IAC included (1) establishing agreements with international sister organizations, beginning with Mexico; (2) expanding an international presence in the LFE reconnaissance teams; (3) developing specific strategies to recruit international members; (4) providing a role for international members in mitigation information dissemination; (5) translating some EERI publications into selected foreign languages; (6) improving attendance and visibility of international members at EERI meetings; and (7) sending the Distinguished Lecturer to at least one developing country. NEHRP Reauthorization: The Board approved preparation of a letter to be sent to technical organizations with a request for use of their names in support of reauthorization. Ballantyne suggested enlarging the base of support by bringing in private sector organizations in Project Impact cities to work with the research community. The Board discussed the need for the engineering community to endorse increased congressional funding of the ANSS program, which is included in EERI s research plan. Announcements Park and Paulay Symposium The year 2003 marks the celebration of significant birthdays for two of New Zealand s most renowned earthquake engineers. Tom Paulay turns 80 and Bob Park will be 70. To commemorate their immense contributions to earthquake engineering, the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Canterbury and other notable groups are organizing a special symposium and gala to be held in Christchurch on Friday, July 11, This occasion will feature a one-day technical symposium, a gala dinner on the evening of July 11, and an informal morning tea on July 12 with guided tours of the Department of Civil Engineering. Colleagues interested in attending are encouraged to send an to c.price@civilaa.civil.canterbury. ac.nz. Full registration details will be available by early February at Travel Funds to Establish Research Collaborations The Women s International Science Collaboration Program (WISC) is a partnership between the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the National Science Endowment Fund Donors EERI would like to acknowledge the following Endowment Fund contributions. $1000-$2000 John McKee Coil Chris D. Poland $500-$999 Cynthia L. Perry $200-$499 Robert P. Kennedy Henry J. Lagorio $100-$199 Fu Lien (Henry) Chang Bruce Clark Clement J. Finney, Jr. William T. Holmes Steven B. Tipping Sharon L. Wood Howard Zee Foundation (NSF) to increase the participation of women in international scientific research. WISC awards on a competitive basis small travel grants of up to $4,000 or $5,000 (depending on region) to U.S. scientists to plan new collaborations with colleagues all over the world. These activities are expected to lead to full research proposals to be submitted to NSF or other funders. For more information: www. aaas.org/international/wiscnew. shtml. The next deadline for proposals is February 7, News of the Profession Academic Job Opportunity University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Tenure-track faculty position in geosystems and geoinformatics whose research will focus on the dynamics of crustal and mantle geosystems through interdisciplinary synthesis and computational geoscience. Candidates should understand the role of advanced IT in system-level geoscience and have a commitment to teaching and curriculum development. By February 1, 2003, applicants should send a CV, a statement of research and teaching interests, and three references to T. H. Jordan, Search Committee Chair, Dept. of Earth Sciences, USC, Los Angeles, CA Other Amounts Claudio Chesi Ted M. Christensen Thomas Heausler Joe Hollstein Cynthia A. Hoover Victor M. Pavon Stanley Sommer Hjortur Thrainsson 5

6 News of the Profession Seismic Safety of School Buildings in Latin America Sponsored by the University of California Pacific Rim Research Program, Tokyo Soil Research Co. (Japan), and the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, the workshop Seismic Safety of School Buildings in the Latin American Pacific Rim: Formulation of an International Strategy was held October 3-4, 2002, at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). There were 28 attendees from nine countries including Chile (Universidad de Chile), Peru (CISMID), Ecuador (Escuela Politecnica Nacional), Colombia (Universidad de los Andes), Costa Rica (LANAMME), Mexico (CENAPRED, CICESE, Proteccion Civil Mexicali), New Zealand (University of Canterbury), Japan (BRI, and NILIM), and the United States (UCSD, GHI, OAS, CDSA, Rutherford & Chekene). Members of the International Advisory Committee included Julio Kuroiwa (Peru), Cinna Lomnitz (Mexico), Enrique Luco (USA), Rodolfo Saragoni (Chile), Brian Tucker (USA), and Yutaka Yamazaki (Japan). Common problems and different perspectives on solutions were debated by the participants, with the only goal being improvement of the seismic safety of school buildings in the Latin American region. Topics included rapid visual screening of school buildings, typical structures and construction systems of school buildings, typical retrofitting strategies, and cost issues. One of the resolutions of this successful workshop was to hold another meeting and request a special session at the 13 th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering. For more information, contact Jorge Meneses of UCSD, phone 858/ , jfmeneses@ucsd. edu. News of the Membership Herman Elected to ICC Board EERI member Frederick M. Herman, chief building official for the city of Palo Alto, California, was recently elected to serve on the Board of Directors of the newly organized International Code Council (ICC). The ICC is comprised of the three former leading U.S. building safety organizations BOCA (Building Officials and Code Administrators), ICBO (International Conference of Building Officials), and SBCCI (Southern Building Code Congress International). The new ICC is expected to begin operations in late January. In 1995, Herman participated in EERI s Workshop on Social, Economic, and Political Analysis of Engineering Design Decisions that led to the 1996 publication of EERI s first Endowment Fund white paper, Public Policy and Building Safety. Call for papers DFI Annual Meeting The Deep Foundations Institute (DFI) has issued a call for papers for its 2003 Annual Conference on Deep Foundations, scheduled for October 22-24, 2003, in Miami Beach, Florida, with the theme of Deep Foundations in Compressible Soil and Soft Rock. Abstracts of approximately 250 words are due January 31 and should be sent to Deep Foundations Institute, 120 Charlotte Place, Third Floor, Englewood Cliffs, NJ 07632, phone: 201/ , fax: 201/ , dfihg@dfi.org. All authors of accepted abstracts will be required to submit papers not to exceed 15 pages for inclusion in the proceedings. For more details see 6 Announcements Special Sessions at Geotech Case Histories Conference Special sessions on (1) geotechnical aspects of the 2002 Italy and Alaska earthquakes and (2) mitigation and design for liquefaction have been added to the program of the Fifth International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering, which will take place in New York City April 13-17, One-page abstracts for these sessions should be submitted to eqconf@umr.edu by April 1, Papers are due August 1, The conference web site web.umr.edu/ ~eqconf/5thchconf/ contains lists of topics within these special sessions and instructions for formatting and submitting abstracts. U.S./China Research Exchange Program U.S. researchers in the fields of earthquake studies, earthquake engineering, and earthquake hazards mitigation are invited to participate in the US/PRC Research Exchange Program in Earthquake Studies. The program is designed to further cooperative research in earthquake hazard mitigation between the United States and the People s Republic of China (PRC). It is jointly sponsored by the National Science Foundation (US) and the Ministry of Construction (PRC), and coordinated by the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (MCEER), headquartered at the State University of New York at Buffalo. Exchanges are expected to begin as early as February Travel must be completed by June 30, The application deadline is January 31, Applications may be downloaded from the MCEER web site: mceer.buffalo.edu/outreach/ intactivity/usprc2002.asp.

7 CALENDAR Items that have appeared previously are severely abbreviated. The issue containing the first, or most informative, appearance is indicated at the entry s end. Items listed for the first time are shown in bold JANUARY Consequence-Based Engineering Institute, College Station, TX. Info: mae.ce.uiuc.edu/ Education/CBEInstitute/cbe.html (10/02) FEBRUARY 3-6. IMAC Conference and Exposition on Structural Dynamics, Kissimmee, FL. Info: (5/02) 5-8. EERI Annual Meeting, Portland Marriott Downtown, Portland, OR. Info: See page 1. (9/02, 10/02, 11/02, 12/02, 1/03) Pacific Conference on Earthquake Engineering, Christchurch, New Zealand. Info: nz/pcee (1/02, 12/02) Landslide and Analysis Workshop. Los Angeles, CA. Info: www. scec.org/resources/landslide.html (12/02) Catastrophe Management for the Americas, Orlando, FL. qecat@absconsulting.com (12/02) MARCH th US/Japan Workshop on Urban Earthquake Hazard Reduction, Maui, HI. Info: news/meetings/abstracts.html (10/02) APRIL Disaster-Resistant California Conference, San Jose, CA. Info: (9/02). 30-May 2. SSA-2003 Annual Conference, San Juan, Puerto Rico. Info: civil.uprm.edu/ssa-2003 (11/02). MAY Los Angeles Tall Buildings Council, Los Angeles, CA. Info: gbrandow@bjase.com (11/02) Fourth International Conference on Earthquake Engineering and Seismology, Tehran, Iran. Info: iiees@dena.iiees.ac.ir (6/02) Fifth National Conference on Earthquake Engineering, Istanbul, Turkey. Info: 5udmk (8/02) 29-June 1. ASCE 2003 Structures Congress, Seattle, WA. Info: structures2003/ (11/02) JUNE 1-4. Ninth North American Masonry Conference, Clemson, SC. Info: Conferences/9NAMCmain.html (8/02) Fourth International Conference on the Behavior of Steel Structures in Seismic Areas, Naples, Italy. Info: congres.htm (6/02) JULY 6-9. Ninth International Conference on Applications of Statistics and Probability in Civil Engineering, San Francisco, CA. Info: icasp9. berkeley.edu (6/02) Park and Paulay Symposium, Christchurch, New Zealand. See page 5. (1/03) AUGUST 3-6. Extreme Loading Conference, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Info: (6/02) Sixth U.S. Conference and Workshop on Lifeline Earthquake Engineering (TCLEE), Long Beach, CA. Info: conferences/tclee2003/ (9/02) SEPTEMBER SEAOC Convention, Lake Tahoe, CA. thale@ oshpd.state.ca.us. (12/02) Fourth International Conference on Earthquake-Resistant Engineering Structures, Ancona, Italy. Info: conferences/2003/eres03/ (8/02) OCTOBER th World Seminar on Seismic Isolation, Energy Dissipation and Active Vibration Control of Structures, Yerevan, Armenia. Info: www. aua.am (10/02) Deep Foundations Institute 28th Annual Conference on Deep Foundations, Miami Beach FL. See page 6. (1/03) DECEMBER Ninth East Asia Pacific Conference on Structural Engineering and Construction, Bali, Indonesia. Info: (10/02) 2004 APRIL Fifth International Conference on Case Histories in Geotechnical Engineering, New York, NY. Info: See page 6. (8/02, 1/03) MAY Structures 2004, Nashville, TN. Info: conferences/structures2004/ (8/02) JULY Composite Construction in Steel and Concrete V, Kruger National Park, South Africa. Info: www. engconfintl.org/4ab.html (12/02) AUGUST th World Conference on Earthquake Engineering, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Info: (7/02) MOVIC 04 Motion and Vibration Control Conference, Washington University, St. Louis, MO (11/02) 7

8 News of the Membership J. P. Singh and Robert E. Wallace Receive Awards J. P. Singh EERI member J. P. Singh recently received the 2002 Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Thapar Institute of Engineering and Technology in Patiala, India, for his significant international contributions to mitigating earthquake losses and improving seismic safety in the areas of seismology and geotechnical earthquake engineering. He graduated in civil engineering from the Thapar Institute in He then received an MS in soil mechanics in 1966 and a Ph.D. in earthquake engineering in 1981, both from the University of California at Berkeley. He worked on many national and international projects for the geotechnical engineering firm Dames & Moore, including the first two nuclear power plants in Iran. In 1987, Singh founded his own firm, Geospectra Inc., which was acquired by Kleinfelder in He remained with this merger as a principal until 1996, when he founded another firm, J.P. Singh & Associates, now located in El Sobrante, California. Singh is a frequently invited speaker at meetings, has participated in many postearthquake investigations, has authored more than 100 technical papers, and has chaired numerous committees related to seismic risk reduction and building code issues. EERI honorary member Robert E. Wallace received the Career Contribution Award from the Structural Geology and Tectonics Division of the Geological Society of America at their annual meeting in Denver on October 29. Wallace is retired from the U.S. Geological Survey, where he served as chief scientist in the Office of Earthquakes, Volcanoes and Engineering. In 1999, EERI published a book-length interview with Wallace as part of its Connections oral history series. A pioneer in the emerging field of paleoseismology, Bob Wallace studied and published papers on the San Andreas Fault throughout his career. Working closely with other EERI members, he played a major role in the writing, promotion, and enactment of legislation creating the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program in Wallace is best known internationally for co-chairing the geological program on the worldwide characterization of major active faults. This project brought together for the first time earthquake geologists from countries around the world, a collaboration that has continued to this day through the International Lithosphere Program, the INQUA Neotectonics Commission, and other forums. EARTHQUAKE ENGINEERING RESEARCH INSTITUTE th Street, Suite 320 Oakland, CA ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED PRSRT FIRST CLASS U.S. POSTAGE PAID Sundance Press