Civil Engineer and Expert Witness: Geotechnical Damage Analysis of Structures, Dams, Levees, Soils, Waste Containment Facilities

Expertise

• Registered Professional Civil Engineer, Illinois
• Landslides - Design of slopes to causation analyses for litigation
• Use of Geosynthetics in Civil Engineering - water resources to retaining walls
• Foundation Engineering - design of foundations, settlement, and water effects
• Expansive Soils - damage to all types of structures
• Geotechnical design of waste containment facilities - static and seismic design
• Geotechnical analysis of dams and levees - static and seismic design

Experience

• Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering: 1999 - to date.
• Director, PVC Geomembrane Institute-Technology Program
• Program Coordinator, Transportation Networks Program, Mid-America Earthquake Center
• Assistant Professor of Civil Engineering: San Diego State University, 1987-1991
• Staff Engineer: Woodward-Clyde Consultants, Walnut Creek, CA: Subsurface investigations and design of remedial measures for landslides in Contra Costa County, geotechnical and structural design of retaining walls, and lateral load behavior of drilled shaft foundations, 1983
• Staff Engineer: Woodward-Clyde Consultants, San Francisco, CA -- Liquefaction analyses, probabilistic seismicity evaluations, and seismic response analysis of power plants and earth dams, 1981-1982

Honors & Publications

• Elected Fellow, American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), 2005
• R.M. Quigley Award, for “best” paper in the Canadian Geotechnical Journal in 2002, "Liquefied Strength Ratio from Liquefaction Flow Failure Case Histories", Canadian Geotechnical Society
• Walter L. Huber Civil Engineering Research Prize, “advancing the basic understanding of natural slopes, the stability of man-made slopes, and the evaluation of the strength/stability of soils subjected to earthquake loadings”
• "Surviving on Earth: Environmental Geology and Natural Hazards"
• 5 Patents granted or pending, Stabilized Fluid Barrier Member: Method of Forming

Education

• Ph.D., Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, Geotechnical Engineering
• M. Engineering, University of California at Berkeley, Geotechnical Engineering
• B.S., University of Delaware (with Honors), Civil Engineering
• J.D., cum laude, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, College of Law