Flash flood expert to give 11th annual Lovell Lecture

By Brett Fails
University News Service
October 13, 2009

Eve Gruntfest, widely published and internationally recognized expert in the field of natural hazard mitigation, will be the keynote speaker at the 2009 Lovell Distinguished Lecture at Texas State University-San Marcos Oct. 19.

The Lovell Lecture will be held on the 11th floor of the J.C. Kellam Building on campus, and launch the inaugural International Flash Flood Laboratory (IFFL) Workshop. The IFFL will develop “from the ground up” tasks the Laboratory undertakes will be conceptualized by Workshop participants who will identify needs that must be addressed in order to mitigate the impacts of flash floods.

The lecture is sponsored by the James and Marilyn Lovell Center for Environmental Geography and Hazards Research, in the Department of Geography.

Gruntfest has published widely and her specialties lie in the areas of warning systems, flash flooding and integrating social science into atmospheric science. She was awarded the Kenneth E. Spengler Award in 2009.

Gruntfest was a professor at the University of Colorado from 1980 until 2007. Over the last 10 years she has conducted a number of high profile research projects and participated on multiple meteorology boards, including serving as chair on the American Meteorological Society Board on Societal Impacts.

The workshop will determine what activities the laboratory should initiate to effectively serve the mission of reducing flash flood casualties and associated damage.

Registered participants from all walks of life are invited to help determine how the IFFL will evolve to achieve the common goal of reducing flash flood fatalities and property loss, not only in Texas’ notorious “Flash Flood Alley” but around the world.

For more information, and to register for the Workshop, please visit: http://www.geo.txstate.edu/lovell/IFFL/Workshop.html.