Volume 31, N. 3, September-December 2008 | PDF(4 downloads)
Abstract
The author first met Victor de Mello in 1975 at the 6th African Regional Soil Mechanics Conference in Durban, South Africa. For over 30 years he has retained a close personal friendship with this remarkable man and his family. The First Victor de Mello Lecture illuminates something of him as a person, an engineer and a philosopher. It describes his upbringing and schooling in India, his university education at MIT and some highlights of his professional career as an international civil engineer specialising in dams and geotechnics. The key messages from some of his major lectures are presented and discussed. Engineers of all disciplines have much to learn from this brilliant, inspiring and cultured man. Above all we can learn from his insistence that we are human beings first, engineers second and specialists third - the order being very important.
