Alec Skempton

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Sir
Alec Skempton
Soil Mechanics
InstitutionsImperial College London, UK
Academic advisorsAlfred Pippard
Notable studentsAlan W. Bishop

Sir Alec Westley Skempton FRS FREng (4 June 1914 – 9 August 2001)[1] was an English civil engineer internationally recognised, along with Karl Terzaghi, as one of the founding fathers of the engineering discipline of soil mechanics.[2] He established the soil mechanics course at Imperial College London, where the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department's building was renamed after him in 2004,[3] and was knighted in the 2000 New Year Honours for services to engineering. He was also a notable contributor on the history of British civil engineering.

Career

Skempton was born in Northampton and attended Northampton grammar school. In 1932 Skempton he went to the

Goldsmiths' Company bursary-funded PhD, he joined the Building Research Station (BRS) in 1936, initially working on reinforced concrete before moving to soil mechanics in 1937.[1]

The failure of an earth embankment for a reservoir at Chingford in north-east London helped highlight Skempton's insights on clay strata. Other projects included Waterloo Bridge, the Muirhead dam near Largs in Scotland, Gosport Dockyard and the Eau Brink Cut channel of the River Great Ouse near King's Lynn.[1]

In 1945, Skempton was seconded from BRS to establish a soil mechanics course at

Imperial College (recruiting Alan W. Bishop as his first member of staff),[4] becoming a full-time lecturer there in 1946, and introducing, in 1950, the first postgraduate course in soil mechanics. In 1955, he was elevated to the chair of soil mechanics, and from 1957 to 1976 was head of department and professor of civil engineering.[1]

He made great contributions in the field of quaternary geology and was widely consulted on problems involving landslips, foundations, retaining walls and embankments. Notable projects included the Mangla Dam in Pakistan and the Carsington Dam failure in Derbyshire in 1984.[3]

Research

Skempton worked on many high-profile projects through his life, notably the back analysis of the Chingford reservoir failure (July 1937) and other embankment dams, including that at Chew Valley Lake, for which he designed an array of sand-drains to accelerate consolidation of the weak alluvial foundations, the first such in the UK.[5]

In situ behaviour of natural clays was of great interest to Skempton, who wrote two papers published by the Geological Society on the geological compaction of natural clays. Among other academic writings, he formulated concepts such as that of A and B pore water pressure coefficient which is still widely used today. Many of his research documents and other writing are available in the Skempton and Bishop Archives at Imperial College.[6]

He was a founding member of the Institution of Civil Engineers' Soil Mechanics and Foundations committee (now the British Geotechnical Association).

Skempton was also an influential contributor to the history of civil engineering. He chaired the civil engineers archive panel at ICE where he edited works on

A Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers of the British Isles, eventually published in 2002.[1]

Honours and awards

UK

Skempton was a member of the

Skempton Building
.

Other accolades included Fellow of the

IStructE
). He was knighted for services to engineering in the 2000 New Year Honours.

International

Skempton was elected as the second President of the International Society of Soil Mechanics and Foundation Engineering, following Terzaghi, in 1957.[3] He also won the Terzaghi award from the American Society of Civil Engineers.

See also

  • Imperial College Civil & Environmental Engineering

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Dwyer, Joseph (4 October 2001). "Sir Alec Skempton (obituary)". The Guardian. Retrieved 7 September 2013.
  2. doi:10.1098/rsbm.2003.0030
    .
  3. ^ a b c "Professor Sir Alec Skempton". Imperial College. Retrieved 8 September 2013.
  4. ^ "Professor Alan W. Bishop Landmark Years 1920 – 1945". The Skempton and Bishop Archives. Imperial College. Retrieved 8 September 2013.
  5. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/76140. (Subscription or UK public library membership
    required.)
  6. ^ "The Skempton and Bishop Archives". Faculty of Engineering, Imperial College. Retrieved 8 September 2013.

Further reading

A Particle of Clay: the Biography of Alec Skempton.

ISBN 1-870325-84-2

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