FROM THE CHAIRMAN

The 8^th Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the IAHR - Hong Kong Chapter was held on the 16-th of December, 2004 at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. The guest of honor at the AGM was Dr. N. Tamai, Vice President & Council Member of IAHR (see Photo 1).  Following the reports from Chairman (Prof. Mohamed Ghidaoui), Student Representative (Mr. William Nixon) and Treasurer (Dr. Onyx Wai), new officers for Year-2005 were nominated and confirmed by the members in AGM. Dr. N. Tamai delivered a stimulating and informative address, where he provided a summary of the activities of the parent organization, International Association for Hydraulic Research (IAHR) which is based in Madrid, Spain. He congratulated the Hong Kong chapter in its achievements and wished it continual success. The inaugural Honorary Fellow Award was then presented by Dr. Tamai to Dr. Choi Yu-Lok. Mr. Lawrence Ho, (Senior Engineer from the HK Drainage Services Department) delivered a 45-min highly interesting talk on "Harbour Area Treatment Scheme--Stage 2."
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Photos: Prof. Tamai addressing members of IAHR-Hong Kong during the AGM of 2004 (left). Invited speaker Mr. Lawrence Ho is thanked by the president of IAHR-HK (right).

 
Since the last AGM, the world has witnessed painful reminders of the devastating forces of water in the form of Tsunami waves in the Indian Ocean and Hurricanes surges in New Orleans, US. What is disturbing is that the devastating consequences of the Tsunami in Asia and the Hurricanes in the USA could have been at least partially mitigated.  Surely, we have the scientific knowledge to appreciate and model the potential consequences of Tsunamis and hurricanes. In fact, just a little  more than 2 years before Hurricane Katrina happened, Brouwer wrote an article in the Civil Engineering magazine, June 2003, Volume 73, Number 6, which explores what would happen if a storm of category 4 or 5 were to hit the city of New Orleans. He writes

"In the 1990s, Suhayda [a hydraulic modeler] began modeling category 4 and 5 storms hitting New Orleans from a variety of directions. His results were frightening enough that he shared them with emergency preparedness officials throughout Louisiana. If such a severe storm were to hit the city¡­the water level would easily top embankments and fill the streets to a depth of 25 ft (7.6 m) or more."

The good news is that hydraulic engineers have developed the technical tools to accurately model and predict complex scenarios such as surges induced by Hurricanes. The bad news is that hydraulic engineers were unable to convince authorities to act and further protect the city from surge waves. This serves to highlight that engineers must not only be technical experts, they must also strive to become societal leaders. We cannot stand aside and let those with little or no engineering expertise set policies to deal with the problems facing humanity and the environment such as water pollution, water related disasters and global warming.  Simply put, engineers cannot neglect politics! It is worthwhile recalling what Plato has said:

"When intelligent people ignore politics, they ultimately find themselves being ruled by the less intelligent -- and the unscrupulous."   

Hydraulic engineers and engineers in general need to work together to excel technically, to become role models and respected leaders in the society. These traits are necessary if the society is to support the public policies advanced by engineers and if the field of engineering is to continue to attract the brightest young minds.  It is crucial that IAHR-Hong Kong reaches out more to high schools and the public at large. We have among us the technical expertise and leadership qualities to lead and shape the future of the water sector and its related policies in Hong Kong and region.

On behalf of the Committee, I would like to extend my very best wishes to all IAHR-HK members for a prosperous and happy 2006.

Mohamed S. Ghidaoui. 

IAHR-HK COMMITTEE (December 2004 to December 2005)

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SUMMARY OF PAST ACTIVITIES: CONFERENCES, SEMINARS AND SHORT COURSES

The past 12 months have seen a healthy stream of activities organized by the chapter. These activities are listed below. More details about these activities can be found the chapter¡¯s webpage. 

Workshops

1. Ocean Circulation and Modeling Workshop, 14 June 2005.  Twelve talks were presented by scientists from Canada, USA, HKSAR and China. More details can be found in http://web.hku.hk/~iahrhk/events/default.htm.
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2. Deep Bay Forum: Impacts of Infrastructure Development on Hydrodynamics and, 23 April 2005. The forum was highly successful and there over 80 attendees. More details can be found in http://web.hku.hk/~iahrhk/events/default.htm

Seminars

1. Predictive Modeling of Lake Eutrophication and Algal Blooms, April 22, 2005.  

Speaker: Prof. Friedrich Recknagel, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Adelaide, Australia.

2. A Multi-scale Ocean Modeling System for the South China Sea, April 30, 2005.

Speaker: Prof. Jianping Gan, Department of Mathematics & Atmospheric, Marine and Coastal Environment (AMCE) Program, HKUST.

3. Development of Large Scale Coherent Structures in Sheared Turbulent Shallow Flows, April 30, 2005.

Speaker: Prof. M.S. Ghidaoui, Department of Civil Engineering, HKUST.

4. Time and Space Scales of Interactions between the Ecology and the Hydraulic Environment in Natural Systems, May 30, 2005.

Speaker: Prof. Jörg Imberger, Environmental Engineering, Chair of Centre for Water Research, University of Western, Australia.

Courses

1.          A 30-hour course on ¡°Hydraulics of open channel and pipe flows¡± over 10 weeks, late 2004.

Speakers: Prof C.W. Li, Poly U; Prof. J.H. Lee, HKU, and Prof. M.S. Ghidaoui, HKUST.

2.          A 3-day course on ¡°Water hammer (Surge) analysis and surge protection¡±, July 18, 20 and 22^nd, 2005.

Speakers: Prof. M.S. Ghidaoui, HKUST & Dr D.A. McInnis, Komex International Ltd, Calgary, Canada.

Study Tour  

1.          WASER/IAHR/IRTCES Study Tour to the Three Gorges Project (TGP)

         8-15 August 2005, Yichang, Hubei Province, China

2.     Technical Visit to Croucher Laboratory of Environmental Hydraulics at The University of Hong Kong (Oct. 22, 2005)

Conferences 

Members of IAHR-Hong Kong organised the "4th International Symposium on Environmental Hydraulics and 14th Congress of Asia and Pacific Division, International Association of Hydraulic Engineering and Research", Hong Kong, December 15 - 18, 2004. The conference was highly successful and attended by over 300 academics and engineers from all parts of the world.  

There were about 15 papers presented by our members at "The XXXI International Association of Hydraulic Engineering and Research Congress", September 11th to 16th, 2005, in Seoul Conference Theme: "Water Engineering for the Future -Choices and Challenges". (More information is available in the following webpage.http://www.iahr2005.or.kr/)

POSTS HELD BY MEMBERS OF IAHR-HK IN THE PARENT ORGANIZATION 

The list below also shows that our members are also highly active in the IAHR parent organization.

J. H. W. Lee, Council member of IAHR; Chairman of the IAHR Asian-Pacific Division; member and past chairman of the IAHR fluid mechanics section; and member of the IAHR-IWA Joint Committee on Urban Drainage.

M. S. Ghidaoui, Associate Editor, Journal of Hydraulic Research, IAHR; Members of the advisory board; Journal of Hydroinformatics; Member of IAHR Fluid Mechanics Section; and member of IAHR.      

C. W. Li, Members of the advisory board; Journal of Hydroinformatics and member of IAHR.

Y. K. Yung, member of IAHR.

W. H.O. Wai, member of IAHR.