News of the Institute

13NCEE: Early Bird Registration and Grant Applications Due

 

Registration is open for the 13th National Conference on Earthquake Engineering (13NCEE) taking place in Portland, Oregon from July 13-17, 2026! Early Bird Registration rates are available through February 28, 2026.

 

Applications are also still open for 13NCEE Participation Grants. Computers and Structures, Inc. (CSI) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) have generously made funds available to award participation grants to students, early career members, emergency managers and planners, state and local government representatives, and those who submit high-quality applications with demonstrated need to help defray costs of attending the 13NCEE. Applications are due January 21, 2026. View the Participation Grant page for more information.

Don’t Forget to Renew for 2026!

If you haven’t renewed your EERI membership for 2026 yet, make sure you do so before the grace period ends on February 1! With your EERI membership, you’ll continue to gain opportunities to build community and connections, expand your knowledge of the earthquake risk reduction field, and grow your leadership skills. Log in to my.eeri.org to renew your membership for 2026 today!

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Learning From Earthquakes

New WHE Report on Housing Performance in Türkiye

Contributed by Mia Lochhead, Svetlana Brzev, and Dustin Cook

 

A new report from the World Housing Encyclopedia documents the performance of two common housing typologies present during the 2023 Türkiye earthquake sequence and discusses how the World Housing Encyclopedia project stands as a resource for understanding housing, sharing knowledge, and promoting the use of earthquake-resistant housing worldwide. The devastating earthquakes that struck Türkiye and Syria in February 2023 caused widespread damage, resulting in approximately 38,900 building collapses and severe damage in over 200,000 more (Brzev et al., 2025). The event tragically resulted in the death of over 50,000 people and left upwards of 1.5 million people homeless (Brzev et al., 2025, Aktaş et al., 2024), serving as a stark reminder of the importance of well-built residential construction and the risks and vulnerabilities poor construction can pose in seismically active regions. At the time of the event, residential construction constituted approximately 90% of the building stock in the area exposed to strong shaking (Brzev et al., 2025), and post-earthquake reconnaissance reports noted common patterns and structural vulnerabilities in the region’s common housing typologies (Brzev et al., 2025). Housing is a critical part of the urban landscape, impacting both short- and long-term community performance and recovery. Understanding housing types and vulnerabilities in both Türkiye and around the world is critical to understanding urban risk and resilience to earthquakes.

 

Read the full report here and find more information at the 2023 Kahramanmaras, Turkey, Earthquake Sequence Virtual Earthquake Clearinghouse website.

Applications Open for 2026 Taiwan Travel Study

Applications are now open for the 2026 Learning From Earthquakes Travel Study Program in Taiwan, October 18-24, 2026. The Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) is teaming up with the National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering (NCREE) to host the program.

This 2026 program offers a unique opportunity to learn directly from earthquake experts in the field and to contribute to recovery knowledge from major earthquakes in Taiwan. Following successful past programs in Chile, New Zealand, and Mexico, this field study trip will provide attendees an opportunity to build an understanding of the role and importance of reconnaissance and provide familiarity with long-term reconnaissance and recovery assessment. The program seeks to inspire the next generation of leaders in seismic safety advocacy.

The application form is available here and the deadline to apply is February 20, 2026 at 12 pm PT. For additional information about eligibility to participate, program costs, sponsorship opportunities, and more, view the news post here.

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Webinars

Quick Quake Briefing 2025 Alaska Hubbard Glacier Earthquake

February 5, 2026

12:00 - 1:00 PM Pacific Time

REGISTER HERE

 

EERI’s Northern California Regional Chapter is hosting a FREE webinar on the recent M7 Alaska Hubbard Glacier Earthquake.

 

The M7 earthquake struck on December 6 at 11:41 AM local time. It occurred beneath the Hubbard Glacier in the St. Elias Mountains, a remote glaciated mountain region. The quake occurred at the northern tip of the Fairweather Fault System, part of the boundary between the Pacific and North American plates. It was characterized as a strike-slip event with a shallow depth of 3 miles. The epicentral area is sparsely populated having no reports of damage. However, over 700 landslides and snow avalanches across Alaska and Canada were triggered by the quake. The most intense failures occurred in a 10-mile-wide band along the rupture zone. Notably, some landslides had travel distances more than 3 miles.

 

Speakers:

• Dr. Michael West is the Alaska State Seismologist and head of the Alaska Earthquake Center located in Fairbanks, Alaska. He will explain the seismology of the earthquake and how the Hubbard quake differs from other Alaska earthquakes from the recent past.  

• Dr. Kate Allstadt is a Research Geophysicist at the United States Geological Survey Geologic Hazards Science Center located in Golden, Colorado specializing in coseismic landslides.  She will describe the mechanisms and significance of the numerous landslides and snow avalanches observed.  

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In Memoriam

In Memoriam: W. D. Liam Finn (1933-2025)

 

Professor W. D. Liam Finn (M.EERI 1976), Emeritus Professor at the University of British Columbia and a leader in the field of geotechnical earthquake engineering, passed away on December 24, 2025. Over a career spanning more than five decades, Dr. Finn reshaped the discipline through pioneering research, transformative teaching, and a lifelong commitment to advancing seismic resilience of communities around the world. He received the George W. Housner Medal, EERI’s highest honor, in 2019. Professor Finn’s contributions touched every major facet of geotechnical earthquake engineering. His landmark achievement, the development of an effective stress–based constitutive model for dynamic analysis, revolutionized how engineers simulate pore pressure generation and liquefaction under cyclic loading. This breakthrough provided the first practical framework for effective stress dynamic analysis of earth structures and remains a cornerstone of modern seismic design. His pioneering work paved the way for the models and methods now used in seismic design and retrofit projects around the world.  Dr. Finn graduated from the National University of Ireland in 1954 with a B.Eng. in Civil Engineering, and received his M.Sc. and Ph.D. from the University of Washington in Seattle in 1957 and 1960. He founded Canada’s first department of geotechnical earthquake engineering at UBC, and later served as the university’s Head of Civil Engineering and Dean of Applied Science. In 1999, he was appointed the first Anabuki Professor of Foundation Geodynamics at Kagawa University, Takamatsu, Japan. Beyond his technical brilliance, Professor Finn was a gifted educator and mentor. He inspired generations of students, many of whom now lead research programs, shape seismic design codes, and design major infrastructure across the world.   Read the full obituary at the EERI website here.

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Spectra

Don’t Miss the December 2025 Issue

The December 2025 issue (Volume 41, Issue 5) of Earthquake Spectra is available online!

 

The Editor’s Choice paper is ”Quantitative validation of NASA ARIA damage proxy maps for detection of ground displacement from surface fault rupture from the 2019 Ridgecrest earthquake sequence” by Timothy M O’Donnell, Paolo Zimmaro, Eric J Fielding, and Jonathan P Stewart.

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Students

2026 SDC Registration Grants

Registration grants are available for teams participating in the 2026 Seismic Design Competition! These grants are designed to help teams attend SDC 2026 and will be awarded based on recent SDC participation history and the team's demonstrated likelihood of attending the competition.

 

All teams in need are welcome to apply. Priority will be given to teams that have not participated in the SDC in the last 3 years.

 

As part of your application, you'll need to submit a written plan detailing how your team will:

• Pay for other competition expenses (lodging, travel, tower shipment, materials, etc.)

• Complete all competition deliverables (proposal, physical tower, presentation, architecture, etc.)

 

The SLC Executive Committee and EERI will evaluate applications based on the quality of the submitted plan and recent SDC participation history. Selected teams will receive grants to cover competition registration for up to 5 team members.

 

Only one representative per team should submit an application. For more information, see the application form here. Applications are due by January 23, 2024, at 11:59 pm Pacific Time.

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Announcements

Blume Distinguished Lecture by Glenn Bell

Glenn Bell will give the next J.A. Blume Distinguished Lecture on the topic “Structures, Safety, and Society: Learning When Things Go Wrong,” at Stanford University next month. In this engaging lecture, Bell, a Research Engineer at NIST and former CEO of SGH, will examine the recurring technical and procedural causes of structural failures, drawing on his 45-year investigative career, which has spanned from the 1981 walkways collapse at the Hyatt Regency in Kansas City, Missouri, to the 2021 partial collapse of Champlain Towers South in Surfside, Florida. In addition to technical aspects, the lecture will cover initiatives to address some of the challenges of translating lessons learned into safer structures that are multidisciplinary and extend well beyond the technical domain of engineers and builders.

 

The lecture will take place at 4:30 PM on Wednesday, February 11, 2026 in Room 300 of the Huang Engineering Center on the Stanford campus. For further information, see the lecture announcement here.

NHERI Webinar with Robert Fleischman

As part of the NHERI Presents webinar series, earthquake engineer Robert Fleischman is speaking on January 21 on the topic of seismic collectors in steel composite floor and roof systems — based on work conducted at NHERI Lehigh and NHERI at UC San Diego.   This webinar series highlights high-impact NHERI research. Fleischman’s findings on precast concrete floor diaphragms have been included in the ASCE 7-16 Load Standards and Part 3 of the 2015 National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP) Recommended Provisions for Seismic Design for New Buildings. The webinar will take place from 1:00 - 1:30 PM Central Time on Wednesday January 21. Register here to attend.

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Opportunities

Career Opportunities at Structural Focus

Structural Focus is seeking Senior Design Engineers and Project Engineers! Since 2001, the Los Angeles firm has designed several million square feet of new structures and rehabilitated hundreds of existing buildings, including many designated National Historic structures. Whether the projects involve adaptive re-use or detailed laboratories, acoustically-sensitive post-production facilities or performance spaces, education facilities or corporate headquarters, the Structural Focus team provides a comprehensive effort to achieve the project goals and create the facility envisioned on time and on budget. We are an Equal Opportunity Employer and also place a strong importance on inclusion at every organizational level. We take pride in our distinctive company culture embodying diversity and multiple backgrounds together in our workplace.

 

If you are interested in designing creative spaces for clients like Netflix, Google, Amazon Studios, and more, Structural Focus is the place for you! Position descriptions, qualifications, and information on how to apply can be found here.

CGS Hiring a Seismic Electronics Specialist

The California Geological Survey is seeking applicants for the job of Supervisory Seismic Electronics Specialist (Senior Precision Electronics Specialist). The electronics specialist will be responsible for planning, organizing, and directing the work of a group of technicians in the installation, organization and maintenance of earthquake accelerometers and seismic recording equipment at ground response stations, in buildings, dams, and at other sites throughout the state, in support of the Earthquake Engineering Program (EEP) in the Department of Conservation’s California Geological Survey.

 

Applications are due January 23, 2026. For more information about the position and how to apply, view the job posting here.

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Subscribing Member Spotlight

Degenkolb

Degenkolb Engineers is a longtime EERI Platinum-Level Subscribing Member and a Sustainer-level donor of the EERI Learning from Earthquakes Endowment Fund. Founded in 1940, Degenkolb's practice reflects more than eight decades of commitment to technical expertise, exceptional client service through close collaboration, and life-long learning. The firm is committed to helping institutions and individuals recover after disaster and build resilient communities. Degenkolb pioneers first-of-its-kind engineering, including the recent first instance of viscous wall dampers in the United States at CPMC Van Ness & Geary Hospital, and the first US tsunami evacuation center in the state of Washington.

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News of the Profession

Links to Recent News and Views

NASA uses satellite technology to better understand earthquakes (CBS, quoting EERI member Eric Fielding) Data fraud scandal hits Japan nuclear power plant in megaquake zone (South China Morning Post) A 9.0 magnitude earthquake could eclipse all past B.C. disasters combined: provincial report (CBC) University of Alaska funds tsunami detections station through January as federal funding remains uncertain (KTUU) Haiti’s Citadelle Laferrière rehabilitation work preserves a monument—and livelihoods (The Haitian Times) Colchester 1884: The Great English Earthquake remembered (Colchester Gazette)

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