Alec Skempton
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Sir Alec Skempton (1914–2001) was a leader in and founding father of soil mechanics. As a founding member of the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) Soil Mechanics and Foundations Committees he studied at City and Guilds College London and established the Soil Mechanics course at Imperial College London, where the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department's building is named after him.
Skempton worked on many high profile projects through his life as well as occupying important positions within ICE; notably the Chingford reservoir failure and as the chair of the civil engineers archive panel at ICE where edited work on John Smeaton; who is regarded as the founder of civil engineering.
In situ behavior of natural clays was of great interest to Skempton, who wrote two papers published by the Geological Society on the geological compaction of natural clays. Amongst other academic writings, he formulated concepts such as that of A and B pore water pressure coefficient which is still widely used today.
Other accolades to his name include Fellow of the Royal Society, Founding Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and the second president of International Society of Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, following Terzaghi. Skempton also accumulated medals from ICE, the Geological Society, the Newcomen Society, the Terzaghi award from the American Society of Civil Engineers and a gold medal from the Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE).
[edit] References
- Guardian Unlimited Obituary: [1]
- Geological Society Obituary: [2]
- Famous Engineers - iCivilEngineer: [3]
[edit] External links
- ICE [4]
- IStructe [5]
- Imperial College London Biography on Sir Alec Skempton [www.cv.ic.ac.uk/.../ skempton_biography1.htm]
[edit] Further reading
A Particle of Clay: the Biography of Alec Skempton. ISBN 1-870325-84-2
