Pulse Newsletter

October 15, 2024

News of the Institute

EERI to Introduce New Lifetime Membership!

As the 2025 renewal season approaches, EERI is excited to introduce a new lifetime membership option!  This membership category is designed to enhance membership benefits and strengthen the EERI community. It aims to recognize and retain the organization’s most dedicated members, particularly as they enter into the later stages of their career and transition into retirement. This new membership category allows individuals to purchase and enjoy, for a one-time fee of $5000, the privileges and benefits of EERI membership for the rest of their lives. Regional chapter membership(s) are included in the Lifetime Membership at no additional charge.

To be eligible for lifetime membership, members must be 45 years of age or over, have a history of membership with EERI for at least 5 years, and be committed to upholding EERI’s Code of Conduct. More information about the Lifetime Membership, including instructions on how eligible members can select this option when renewal opens, will be shared later this month when EERI’s new member database and portal becomes available. Keep an eye out for renewal emails or check the news section of the EERI website for more details soon.

EERI's New Member Portal Launches Next Week!

EERI’s new member database will launch next week! We are excited for you to experience our new member portal, which will include improved account and directory options, as well as new features to be introduced later this year. You will need to update your password to log in, which will allow you to review your member profile and contact information, ensure continued access to Spectra and other EERI resources, and renew your membership for 2025. Keep an eye out for an email with detailed instructions on next steps—or check the EERI website for the announcement. 

For more information about our ongoing efforts to enhance EERI infrastructure and operations, view the recent leadership communique from EERI Executive Director Heidi Tremayne. Until the new system launches, the account page on the website will remain read-only except for the option to reset your password. If you experience any issues in the meantime, please contact us at eeri@eeri.org.

Don't Forget to Vote: 2025 EERI Board of Directors Election

Don't forget to cast your vote for the 2025 EERI Board of Directors election! You can view the candidate bios and vision statements here. The election will close on Friday, November 1, 2024 at 11:59 PM Pacific Time. Please check your email for your secure ballot.

Director A:
Craig Davis (M. EERI, 1995)
Manager, C A Davis Engineering
Santa Clarita, California

Shahram Pezeshk (M. EERI, 1989)
Chair and Professor of Civil Engineering, The University of Memphis
Memphis, Tennessee

Director B:
Ezra Jampole (M. EERI, 2012)
Principal, Exponent
New York, New York

Lindsey Maclise (M. EERI, 2011)
Principal, Forell | Elsesser Engineers
San Francisco, California

EERI thanks the 2024 Nominating Committee for their work this year: Erica Fischer (Chair), Nick Gregor, Laurie Johnson, John Hooper, Sarah Wichman, Janiele Maffei (ex-officio), and Heidi Tremayne (ex-officio).

Back to top >

Learning From Earthquakes

EERI-SSEER Reconnaissance Team Travels to Turkey

In partnership with the Social Science Extreme Events Research Network (SSEER), a Learning from Earthquakes Reconnaissance team is currently in Turkey to study recovery and resilience aspects of the 2023 Kahramanmaras, Turkiye Earthquake Sequence. The team will focus primarily on three areas related to community recovery: employment, schools, and housing. Particular emphasis will be placed on functional recovery and the interactions between individual building recovery and community recovery. This reconnaissance trip will build on EERI reconnaissance studies that were conducted in the months after the earthquake sequence began in 2023. The team will be collecting data using a reconnaissance tool developed by EERI’s Housner Fellows that was piloted in May 2024 following the M7.4 April 3, 2024 Hualien, Taiwan Earthquake.

The multi-disciplinary team members include: Michael Mieler, Burcak Basbug, Suleyman Celik, Louise Comfort, Alpay Demiryurek, Ayse Hortacsu, Carlos Molina-Hutt, Sabine Loos, Halil Sezen, and Egemen Sonmez. Opportunities to hear observations and findings from the team will be announced soon. This follow-up reconnaissance trip is made possible by the generous support of the many donors to the LFE Endowment Fund.

Back to top >

Students

Student Chapters: Apply to Host a Friedman Family Visiting Professional

EERI is pleased to announce the launch of the Friedman Family Visiting Professionals Program for the 2024-2025 academic year! Generously funded by the Friedman family and FEMA, the program matches professionals with host universities for a workshop meant to be part lecture and part informal discussion to foster better understanding and communications between earthquake practitioners and academics. 

This year, the program will include a total of 21 professionals that span disciplines including structural and geotechnical engineering, risk analysis, lifelines, industrial facilities, emergency management, and resilience. EERI Student Chapters must complete this application form to be eligible for a visit from a Friedman Family Visiting Professional. The application deadline is Monday, November 18, 2024 at 11:59pm Pacific Time. All chapters are encouraged to apply! 

Review of applications will begin after November 18. Universities will be notified of their match by early December. Depending on funding availability, approximately 20-25 trips will be funded. Visits are anticipated to take place from February to June 2025. For more information about the Friedman Family Visiting Professionals program, click here.

Back to top >

Webinars

EERI Oral History Webinar: Izzat (Ed) Idriss Interviewed By Ross Boulanger

Friday, October 18, 2024
11:00 AM - 12:00 PM Pacific Time
REGISTER HERE

Join us for a free webinar highlighting the most recent publication from EERI's Connections Oral History series! The webinar will feature Dr. Izzat (Ed) Idriss, a pioneer in the field of geotechnical earthquake engineering. He will share recollections from his long career as an academic and engineering practitioner, which included major contributions to understanding soil sites and structures behavior and participation in in post-earthquake reconnaissance and investigation of several major earthquakes over the last 50 years. Dr. Idriss will be joined by Dr. Ross W. Boulanger, Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Davis, and a longtime colleague and friend, who conducted the interviews for the oral history.

Back to top >

Public Policy and Advocacy

California ACR 151 Adopted in August 2024

This year, the EERI Northern California Regional Chapter engaged in state-level advocacy under the leadership of the chapter president, Richard McCarthy (M.EERI 1994), the former executive director of the CA Seismic Safety Commission. The Board wrote a support letter and took part in advocacy calls in support of the Assembly Concurrent Resolution (ACR) 151–one of the few state actions on seismic safety this year.

ACR 151 is a major step in recognizing the extra effort that goes into making some non-structural building components more resilient to earthquake shaking. Non-structural components within a building system are vital to enabling the structure to be functional/habitable following a damaging earthquake. EERI concurs with ACR 151’s call to prioritize nonstructural components that have been seismically vetted. These off-the-shelf cost-effective technologies will enhance the resilience of the built environment should be given priority for use in new construction and the seismic retrofitting of older buildings. OmegaFlex sponsored the resolution and have been a valuable corporate partner. 

EERI Supports California Proposition 2

EERI recommends a Yes vote on California Proposition 2, a $10 billion school facilities bond to support new construction and renovation, including seismic upgrades, of K-12 public school and community college facilities. Prop. 2 will provide an opportunity to implement much-needed repairs and health and safety upgrades, including seismic retrofits for existing buildings, and to invest in new facilities for school districts across the state. In accordance with EERI’s established commitment to advocate for policies to promote school seismic safety, EERI members based in California are encouraged to vote “Yes” on the November 2024 ballot for California Proposition 2. If the proposition passes, members are also encouraged to coordinate with the EERI California Legislative Subcommittee and Regional Chapters to advocate in their local communities for the allocation of the resulting funds to prioritize seismic retrofit and safety needs for K-12 schools. For more information, view the news post on the EERI website here.

Back to top >

Announcements

FRK Distinguished Lecture Series: Michel Ghosn on Extreme Events Engineering

The 2024 Fazlur Rahman Khan Distinguished Lecture series will present “Design and Safety Assessment of Structures and Infrastructure Systems Subjected to Extreme Events in a Changing Climate” by Michel Ghosn, Professor of Civil Engineering at the City College of the City University of New York, on Tuesday, October 29 at 4:30 PM Eastern (1:30 PM Pacific). The lecture will be live-streamed via Zoom webinar.

Civil infrastructure systems are exposed to various types of human-made, environmental, and climatic hazards within their service lives. Reliability-based approaches and probabilistic risk-informed methods have long been used for assessing the safety of such systems and developing design standards and specifications to account for the random nature of these hazards, their intensities, rates of occurrence, and possible compounding effects. Specifically, current design standards provide reliability-calibrated design load maps and tables as well as load combination factors for use in engineering practice during a structure’s safety assessment process. These maps and associated procedures are based on historical data assuming that the underlying climatic processes are unchanging over time such that observed variations in the historical data are only random oscillations around underlying stationary statistical properties. However, ageing processes, growth in economic activities, and climate change are causing increases in the frequencies and intensities of human-made and environmental hazards, raising the risk to infrastructure systems and their users. This presentation will review the fundamental principles behind structural code developments and their underlying assumptions. It also examines analytical methods to assess the safety of structural systems accounting for the nonstationary nature of climatic hazards. The presentation will present approaches for adjusting current structural design specifications in view of anticipated climate change scenarios. Numerical examples will illustrate the application of these approaches for the safety assessment and the design of structural systems.

Register here to attend.

Kinemetrics Webinar: Earthquake Early Warning with the Aspen Platform

Kinemetrics is hosting a free webinar on earthquake early warning on October 30th at 9:00 AM Pacific Time. Early warning systems have become critical to regional and organizational emergency response. The unexpected nature of earthquakes and the potential for large regional consequences only increases the importance of earthquake early warning. Whether a region is seismically active, or experiences shaking from distant earthquakes, it is paramount for organizations and the public to be able to trust that they will receive the information they require to be safe and respond appropriately when an earthquake strikes. The precious seconds of warning provided by earthquake early warning systems such as that provided by the Kinemetrics Aspen Platform can help to ensure safety and promote effective emergency response.

In this webinar, Dr. Mathias Franke will introduce the concepts and technology behind earthquake early warning and how the Aspen Platform addresses the needs of governments, regional authorities, and organizations. Register here to attend the webinar.

Abstracts for ASCE Geo-Extreme 2025 Due November 1

Geo-Extreme 2025 is an multi-disciplinary event in Long Beach, California from November 2-5, 2025 that illustrates, through case histories and predictions, the challenges associated with extreme events and climate change that are faced by the geotechnical and civil engineering professions. The conference will have short courses and local field trips, as well as sessions on topics that are of interest including:

  • Big data and data analytics for extreme events and the modeling and assessment of compound and cascading events
  • Case histories, lessons learned, and best practices
  • Civil infrastructure and geo-materials under extreme loadings, including performance assessments and numerical simulations
  • Climate model simulations and predictions, including climate-resilient and adaptive infrastructure systems
  • Coastal sustainability and resilience under extreme events and changing climate
  • Decision making, planning and risk management of extreme events, including anticipation, preparedness, response, and recovery from extreme events
  • Geotechnical and geoenvironmental engineering for post-disaster materials management
  • Geotechnical earthquake engineering, seismic slope instabilities, liquefaction, man-made earthquakes and associated geo-hazards
  • Instrumentation and remote sensing of extreme events and their impacts
  • Integrating equity and justice considerations into planning, design, and maintenance of climate-resilient infrastructure in the face of climate change
  • Permafrost, the Arctic and cold regions
  • Wildfires, debris flows and other post-wildfire hazards

Abstracts are due November 1, 2024. View the call for submissions for information on how to submit your abstract.

 

SMIP24 Seminar on Utilization of Strong Motion Data

The California Strong Motion Instrumentation Program (CSMIP) of the California Geological Survey will hold its annual seminar virtually on Thursday, October 17, 2024 from 9:00 AM to 3:00 PM Pacific Time. The annual seminar's purpose is to provide information that will be useful in seismic design practice, post-earthquake response, and the improvement of seis​mic design codes and practices. The SMIP24 Seminar will include various presentations on the analysis and utilization of strong motion data.

The seminar will be held virtually via Zoom webinar. The full seminar program and a link to register are available at the SMIP24 Seminar website here. Registration fees are waived for this year’s seminar.

2024 COSMOS Technical Session and Annual Meeting

Registration is still open for the 2024 COSMOS Technical Session and Annual Meeting. This 2-day hybrid meeting will take place November 14–15, 2024, at the Degenkolb Office Building, 601 12th Street, Second Floor, Oakland, California, 94607. Remote/virtual access will be available for participants who cannot attend in person. Register here to attend the meeting.

COSMOS promotes the use of instrumentation and simulations for ground-motion, geotechnical, and structural response analyses to foster community resiliency by promoting international guidelines, state-of-the-art processes, and global collaboration. Aligned with this mission, the first day of this year’s program includes two related workshops on site characterization and ground motion simulations. The second day will feature relevant presentations on COSMOS/CGS/USGS joint activities, followed by important building code updates and state-of-the-art tools for validating, utilizing, and disseminating simulated ground motion datasets. View the full program agenda and sponsorship information at the COSMOS website

Full NGA-Subduction Database Available Online

The full NGA-Subduction Database is now available online at UCLA. The dataset includes the Excel ground-motion tool as well as various flatfiles containing response spectra for all components, metadata, Arias Intensity, duration, among others. The NGA-Sub Web Portal gives you access to the recorded and processed time series ("Time Histories")—over 70,000 3-component sets. In addition to the .at2 files, we have introduced the visualization-friendly .avd format. The website for the database can be found here. If you have any questions please send an email to:  smazzoni@ucla.edu

Back to top >

Opportunities

WGS Hiring Earthquake Hazards and Geophysics Program Manager

The Washington Geological Survey at the Washington Department of Natural Resources is seeking a Lead Scientist and Program Manager for the Earthquake Hazards and Geophysics Program. The program’s mission is to reduce loss from earthquakes through understanding seismic hazards and risks.

The successful applicant will lead a dedicated team, conducting high-level research, managing multi-year projects, and mentoring scientists of diverse backgrounds. The job involves oversee multiple concurrent research projects and collaborate with various partners across local, state, and federal levels. This position will directly contribute to creating comprehensive seismic hazard maps and enhancing public awareness and preparedness for earthquakes, playing a vital role reducing earthquake risk in Washington State.

For more information on the position, requirements, and information on how to apply, view the full job posting here. The closing date for applications is October 24, 2024.

UNR Hiring Tenured Professor of Structural Engineering for Extreme Events

The Civil & Environmental Engineering Department at the University of Nevada, Reno is seeking candidates for a full-time, tenured position in the structural engineering program. The appointment may be at either Associate or Full Professor level, with an anticipated start date of July 1, 2025. Duties include undergraduate and graduate teaching, supervision of graduate students, development and execution of significant externally funded research programs, and university service. The successful candidate may be considered to serve as Director of the Center for Civil Engineering Earthquake Research. The Director is expected to offer visionary leadership, build upon existing research capacity and infrastructure, create new research initiatives, and pursue long-term external and strategic funding for laboratory operations.

View the full description of the position, qualifications, and instructions on how to apply at the job posting here. Review of applications will begin on November 15, 2024, and the search will close without notice when a sufficient number of applications are received or a hiring decision has been made.

Back to top >

Subscribing Member Spotlight

Computers and Structures, Inc.

csi globeComputer and Structures, Inc. is EERI’s Visionary-Level Subscribing Member. CSI was the Anchor Sponsor of the 2024 Annual Meeting and the 2024 Annual Undergraduate Seismic Design Competition, and generously provided support for registration grants allowing students and early career members to attend the meeting. CSI has been a longtime supporter of the Institute and our student activities, including the Student Leadership Council. Founded in 1975 by company president and CEO Ashraf Habibullah (M.EERI,1999), CSI is recognized globally as the pioneering leader in software tools for structural and earthquake engineering. Software from CSI is used by thousands of engineering firms in over 160 countries for the design of major projects, including the Taipei 101 Tower in Taiwan, One World Trade Center in New York, the 2008 Olympics Birds Nest Stadium in Beijing and the cable-stayed Centenario Bridge over the Panama Canal.

Structural Focus

StructuralFocusStructural Focus is a structural engineering consulting company specializing in the design of complex and innovative buildings. Since its founding in 2001, the firm has designed several million square feet of new structures and rehabilitated hundreds of existing buildings, including numerous historic projects, dozens of which are on the National Register of Historic Places.

Back to top >

Image

66 Franklin Street, Suite 300
Oakland, CA, 94607

Phone: 510-451-0905
Fax: 510-451-5411
Email: eeri@eeri.org

Visionary Member
Computers & Structures, Inc. Technology for a better World.
Platinum & Gold Members
Become a Member

At every stage of your career, we provide you with the resources and connections you need to succeed and make an impact.

Join EERI today!