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Biographies of Committee Members
Mete A. Sozen (chair), NAE, is Kettelhut Distinguished Professor of Structural Engineering, at Purdue University. Dr. Sozen specializes in teaching and research related to the analysis and design of concrete structures subject to earthquake and other dynamic loadings. He is the recipient of many awards and honors including: Lindau Award and Kelly Award, American Concrete Institute (ACI); Boase Award, Reinforced Concrete Council; Research Prize, Howard Award and R.C. Reese Award, American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE); General Electric Senior Research Award of the ASCE, Lifetime Achievement Award of The Illinois Section of ASCE, the Parlar Science Award of Middle East Technical University (Turkey); and election to the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences. He is an honorary member of the Association of Turkish Engineers, ASCE, and the ACI. He has served as a member of the Veterans Administration Advisory Committee on Structural Safety; ACI Technical Activities Committee; ACI Committee 318 on the Building Code; and chair of the United States-Japan Cooperative Research Program on Urban Earthquake Hazard Reduction. In 1996, he participated in the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Building Performance Assessment Team's investigation of the Oklahoma City bombing. Dr. Sozen has served as the chair of the National Research Council Committee on Natural Disasters and Committee on Earthquake Engineering. He holds honorary doctorates from Bogazici University (Turkey) and Janusz Pannonious University (Hungary) and has earned a B.S. in civil engineering from Robert College, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in civil engineering from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
Stephen W. Attaway is a distinguished member of the Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratories. His expertise is in computational simulation and modeling and code development for applications in solid mechanics. Dr. Attaway is currently leading research and development for the development of solid mechanics code at Sandia's Engineering Science Center, including the development of coupled codes for blast-structure interaction. He received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in civil engineering, all from the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Erik Auf der Heide is a medical officer with the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He is also an adjunct assistant professor in emergency medicine at the Emory University School of Medicine, where he completed a fellowship in disaster medicine. He is the author of two textbooks and a number of articles on disaster management. Dr. Auf der Heide is a Member of the Disaster Section of the American College of Emergency Physicians. He received his M.D. from Baylor College of Medicine, an M.P.H. in epidemiology from the Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University School of Medicine, and is certified by the American Board of Emergency Medicine.
W. Gene Corley, NAE is vice president of Construction Technology Laboratories. His expertise is in structural concrete for earthquake-resistant construction, the uses of concrete in buildings
and bridges, investigations of structural failure, and building codes. Dr. Corley serves on the Technical Council on Forensic Engineering of the American Society of Civil Engineers and was the principal investigator on the Building Performance Assessment Team dispatched by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to study the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in the aftermath of the bombing. He received his B.S. and M.S. in civil engineering and his Ph.D. in structural engineering from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
Eve Hinman, principal of Hinman Consulting Engineers, has experience in the design and analysis of structures subject to the effects of explosions and project experience in the effects of conventional and nuclear weapons, accidental explosions, and terrorist attack. She has provided consultant services to the General Services Administration, the U.S. Department of State, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. Dr. Hinman has conducted many investigations of accidental explosions and the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. She has a B.S. in civil engineering, an M.S. in structural engineering, and a D.Sc. in engineering mechanics, all from Columbia University.
Robert P. Kennedy, NAE is a consulting engineer in structural mechanics with expertise in structural dynamics, structures, earthquake engineering, engineering mechanics, design codes, and standards. He has experience in static and dynamic analysis and the design of special-purpose civil and mechanical-type structures, particularly for the nuclear, petroleum, and defense industries. He has designed structures to resist extreme loadings, including seismic landings, missile impact, extreme wind, impulsive loads, and nuclear environmental effects, and has developed computerized structural analysis methods. Dr. Kennedy received his B.S. in civil engineering and his M.S. and Ph.D. in structural engineering from Stanford University.
Sam A. Kiger is chairman and C.W. La Pierre Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering and director of the National Center for Explosion Resistant Design (NCERD), at the University of Missouri, Columbia. His areas of expertise are structural analysis and design, structural dynamics, explosion effects, protective construction, and soil-structure interaction. The NCERD is an interdisciplinary center that serves as a national focus for university-based research to create new knowledge and improve understanding of the explosion environment and blast-mitigation technology; create new and improved structural designs and strategies for protection from explosions; and transfer technology through publications, short courses, and university degree programs. Prior to teaching, Dr. Kiger spent many years on the staff of the Waterways Experiment Station of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, where much of his work was focused on the effects of explosions on structures. He received his B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in theoretical and applied mechanics from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
Stuart L. Knoop is a registered architect, a fellow of the American Institute of Architects, and co-founder of Oudens and Knoop, Architects, PC, of Chevy Chase Maryland. He has been involved in design for security for many years, particularly for the U.S. State Department, Office of Foreign Buildings Operations. Oudens and Knoop has designed security upgrades for more than 60 embassies and consulates worldwide. Mr. Knoop has served on the National Research Council (NRC) Committee on Research for the Security of Future U.S. Embassy Buildings and was vice chair of the committee that produced the NRC report, Protecting Buildings from Bomb Damage (National Academy Press, 1995). He is a member of the NRC Commission on
Engineering and Technical Systems. Mr. Knoop holds a B.Arch. from Carnegie Institute of Technology.
Johanna LaPierre, associate vice president at RTKL Associates, Inc., has experience in architectural, interior, and landscape architecture on projects ranging from large-scale office developments and renovations to embassies, hotels, and historic restorations. Her responsibilities have included project management and coordination, design, production of contract documents, and contract administration. She has also been project manager for security upgrades at the U.S. Capitol, U.S. Supreme Court, and Library of Congress, as well as numerous U.S. Department of State facilities worldwide. She holds a B.A. from Cornell College and an M.Arch. from the University of Virginia.
Mark Loizeaux is chairman of the Loizeaux Group of Companies, chief executive officer of Loizeaux Group International, and president of Controlled Demolition, Inc. Mr. Loizeaux has 35 years of experience in both the conventional and explosives demolition trades and provides consulting services on demolition and site clearance, rock removal and vibration control, antiterrorist measures to mitigate the effect of attacks on structures, and forensic analysis of damaged structures to determine the cause of damage. He has been personally responsible for field supervision of the demolition of more than 1,200 structures worldwide and is internationally recognized as a leader in the demolition and explosives industry. Mr. Loizeaux holds a B.S. in business administration from the University of Tennessee.
J.L. Merritt, an independent consulting engineer in civil, geotechnical, and structural engineering, has extensive research and practical experience in the design of protective structures, soil-structure and blast-structure interactions, and earthquake engineering. He has published more than 70 articles, papers, and monographs. Prior to his consulting career he taught at the University of Illinois, where he attained the rank of professor. He is a member of numerous professional societies and a registered engineer in various specialties (civil, geotechnical, and structural) in four states. Dr. Merritt received a B.S. in civil engineering from Lehigh University and an M.S. in civil engineering and Ph.D. in engineering from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
David J. Pelgrim, an engineer with E. K. Fox & Associates Consulting Engineers has been responsible for the design of numerous physical and technical security upgrade projects, the production of feasibility studies, the performance of field investigations, and the creation of construction documents. He has undertaken projects for numerous clients, including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Navy, the U.S. Air Force, the General Services Administration, the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. Department of Justice, and the District of Columbia. He has completed the design of systems at numerous facilities throughout the world, spanning all physical and technical threat levels. In addition to his work in facility security, Mr. Pelgrim has been engaged in a broad range of projects involving the design of power, lighting, fire protection, life safety, communications, automated controls, and other building systems. He has also been involved in the design of innovative building systems as a joint venture between the General Services Administration's Centers for Expertise and Carnegie Mellon University. Mr. Pelgrim holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Maryland at College Park and is a registered professional engineer.
Eugene Sevin, NAE, is an independent consultant. His research interests are nuclear and conventional weapons effects, hardened facility design, and computational structural mechanics. He formerly served with the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) as deputy director, Space and Missiles Systems, and with the Defense Nuclear Agency as assistant to the deputy director (Science and Technology) for experimental research. Dr. Sevin was professor of mechanical engineering at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, and head, Mechanical Engineering Department, at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel. He was also adjunct professor of applied mechanics at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and director of engineering mechanics research at IIT's Research Institute. Dr. Sevin chaired the committee that produced the National Research Council report, Protecting Buildings from Bomb Damage (National Academy Press, 1995). He recently served on a peer review group for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Waterways Experiment Station, and a Defense Science Board Task Force on Underground Facilities. Dr. Sevin has published extensively and has received a number of awards; in October 1998 he was the inaugural recipient of the DoD Shock and Vibration Information Analysis Center's Melvin L. Baron Award in structural dynamics and constitutive modeling. He earned a B.S. in mechanical engineering from IIT, an M.S. from the California Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. in applied mechanics from IIT. He is a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics and has served on numerous DoD and interagency committees.
Charles H. Thornton, NAE, is chairman of Thornton-Tomasetti Engineers/ the LZA Group, Inc., a 350-person organization that provides structural engineering and architectural services, failure analysis, hazard mitigation, and disaster response services. Dr. Thornton has provided expert witness testimony for many clients and is a recognized expert on collapse and structural failure analysis. He led the engineering investigation of the causes of the collapse of the Hartford Coliseum Space Truss Roof, the scaffold collapse at Pleasant Point Power Station, West Virginia, and the collapse of the New York State Thruway Schoharie Bridge. In 1996, he participated in the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Building Performance Assessment Team's investigation of the Oklahoma City bombing. Dr. Thornton is presently a visiting faculty member at Princeton University and Manhattan College; he has taught at Pratt Institute and Cooper Union. Dr. Thornton is a member of the Board of Trustees of Manhattan College, the Applied Technology Council, and the Building Seismic Safety Council. He holds a B.S. from Manhattan College and an M.S. and Ph.D. from New York University.
