The Earthquake Commission (EQC) has awarded Dr Kaley Crawford-Flett the 2019 Ivan Skinner Award.

Sponsored by EQC, alongside the New Zealand Society for Earthquake Engineering, the annual $10,000 Ivan Skinner award recognises and promotes research that reduces the impacts of earthquakes on New Zealand communities. It was presented to Dr Crawford-Flett for her work on dam engineering, in particular the performance of New Zealand embankment dams in regard to seismic events.

Dr Crawford-Flett has made an excellent contribution to earthquake engineering knowledge and she works in an area with considerable potential for further advances, EQC director resilience Dr Hugh Cowan said.

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“Kaley’s work is highly collaborative and strengthened already unique linkages between researchers and industry in a field where few others were practicing,” Cowan noted. “This award will allow Kaley to broaden her world leading research and allow her to put time into writing, publishing and presenting her work internationally.”

Dr Crawford-Flett has been a geotechnical researcher at the University of Canterbury Quake Centre since 2014. She leads academic and industry research on the seismic behaviour of earthfill dam materials. She is also an MBIE-appointed member of the Technical Working Group for proposed New Zealand dam safety regulation and is a reviewer for several academic journals.