Dr. Jason Ingham obtained his doctorate from the University of California San Diego in 1995 and is a Professor of Structural Engineering at the University of Auckland. His research interests are primarily focused on the seismic behaviour of existing masonry and concrete buildings. He led the collection of data related to the performance of masonry buildings following the Canterbury earthquakes, with evidence subsequently presented at the Canterbury Earthquakes Royal Commission. He has also undertaken post-earthquake building inspections in Sumatra (Indonesia) and in Nepal. In 2015, he was a member of a study tour to inspect URM building damage following the Napa (California) earthquake and in 2016 he was a member of the NZAid-funded team that provided technical training to Nepalese engineers on the seismic assessment and improvement of masonry and concrete buildings. He is currently the president of the Structural Engineering Society of NZ (SESOC), a past president of the NZ Concrete Society (NZCS), a past member of the management committee of the NZ Society for Earthquake Engineering (NZSEE), and is a Fellow of Engineering New Zealand. He is also a member of the leadership team for QuakeCoRE, the New Zealand Centre of Research Excellence for Earthquake Resilience.
When Jason was a student at UCSD in the early 1990s, California had had a regular run of major earthquakes whereas New Zealand had had several decades of benign earthquake activity. Jason happened to be in the centre of the city on the day that New Zealand’s second largest city crumbled. Before that he had undertaken building inspections in Sumatra and more recently had been involved in post-earthquake recovery activities in Nepal.
This presentation will seek to inform and inspire that earthquake engineering is not just about shifting the decimal place on the latest design for a new structure according to international best practice. It is also how small improvements and attention to appropriate technologies can save thousands of lives and protect entire communities in some parts of the world.
Lindsay Walton
lwalton@ucsd.edu