20
Geotechnical News • December 2017
CANADIAN GEOTECHNICAL SOCIETY NEWS
SFU has been the integrated use of
characterisation, monitoring and mod-
elling methods in geomechanics.
As numerical modelling increases in
sophistication, the need to improve
characterisation of the rock mass
becomes ever more important. The
advances in monitoring technologies
including ground and satellite based
methods brings with it the potential for
not only improved model constraints
but also improved rock mass charac-
terisation. The advent of these new
technologies has led to the challenges
of “big data” storage, interpretation
and visualization – an area in which
geotechnical engineers will need to be
increasingly involved.
I would like to take this opportunity
to thank many people without whom,
this award would have not been pos-
sible. Firstly, I would like to acknowl-
edge the critical role of my graduate
students who have come from all parts
of the world and enriched my research
program. I would like to thank all my
post-doctoral fellows and in particular
my colleagues and friends
Davide
Elmo
from UBC, Mining and
Mirko
Francioni
from the University of
Exeter. I have particularly enjoyed
working with you,
Erik Eberhardt
and
John Coggan
on developing
brittle fracture-DFN modelling meth-
ods and remote sensing approaches.
I would like to thank my colleagues
at Simon Fraser University,
John
Clague
,
Brent Ward
,
Diana Allen
and
Glyn William-Jones
who I
have enjoyed working with on many
numerical modelling, engineering
geomorphology and remote sensing
projects. I would also like to thank
all my international colleagues and
friends that I have worked with over
the last 20 years, in particular
Monica
Ghirotti
and
Lisa Borgatti
from Italy,
Michel Jaboyedoff
and
Simon Low
from Switzerland and more recently
Jim Griffiths
and
Nick Rosser
in the
UK.
There are too many industry col-
laborators over the years to acknowl-
edge individually, but to all of you, I
thank you for the opportunity to keep
my research industry-focussed with
practical applications. I would like
to acknowledge the contributions of
SRK. Golder Associates, Itasca and
in particular BGC Engineering whose
support of my graduate program and
undergraduate teaching has been a
major benefit to my students.
I first went to a CGS conference in
1987 in Regina some 30 years ago and
it has been a very positive influence on
my career. I would strongly recom-
mend young geotechnical engineers
and geoscientists today to get involved
with CGS. As a member and Chair of
the Rock Mechanics and Engineering
Geology Divisions and Vice President
Technical of CGS I have enjoyed
working with numerous CGS col-
leagues who are present today, many
of whom, I have known for over 20
years.
Most importantly I would like to
thank my wife
Sally
, my daughter
Rosalind
, and my sons
Alistair
and
Philip
who over the years have been
dragged along to numerous landslides
in Canada, the US and overseas. My
wife Sally a long time ago left the UK
to go with me on long term contracts
in Zambia, Hong Kong and Papua
New Guinea before we eventually
came to Canada. She supported me
during my MSc and when I decided
to leave a well paying consultancy job
in Hong Kong to go back to univer-
sity to do a PhD; she was always one
hundred percent behind me – without
you my career would not have been
possible and I certainly would not be
here today.
I am very pleased and honoured to
accept the Legget Medal not only as
an engineering geologist who moved
from the UK to Canada some 30 years
ago but equally as someone whose
father was a 6th generation New-
foundlander and whose family came
from Little Catalina, Bonavista Bay.
En terminant je remercie la société
Canadienne de Géotechnique et le
comité de sélection pour cet honneur.
Thank you et Merci
Doug Stead
October 4, 2017
