It is with sadness that we announce the passing of long-time CGS member, Arvid Landva, on May 4th. Born in Norway, Arvid spent several years after university at the Norwegian Geotechnical Institute with Laurits Bjerrum developing direct simple shear testing equipment. He brought his young family to Canada in 1964 to work with Acres Engineering, then moved to Fredericton, NB, as the resident engineer for the construction of the Mactaquac Dam. This led to his geotechnical teaching career in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of New Brunswick from 1968 until his first retirement in 1995. Arvid then consulted with several geotechnical companies in the Maritimes until his second retirement in 2018. The focus of much of his research and career was on the geotechnical properties of peat and municipal waste – what Arvid referred to as “non-textbook soils.”
Among his other achievements, Arvid was chair of the organizing committee of the 34th Canadian Geotechnical Conference held in Fredericton in 1981, was a CGS Cross Canada Lecturer in 2009, and received the CGS G. Geoffrey Meyerhof Award in 2017.
Our condolences to Jørn Landva – Arvid’s son and a senior geotechnical engineer with Golder Associates in Halifax – and to the entire Landva family.