Ceylon Society of Australia (CSA) Meeting on Sunday 2 June at 6.30 pm at Pennant Hills Community Centre
Prof Buddhima Indraratne and his PhD students at the Talk
The CSA was privileged to present internationally recognised high profile speaker Distinguished Professor Buddhima Indraratna, AM, at the 2 June General Meeting of the Society. The subject of the talk was “Challenges and Advances in Transportation Infrastructure with special reference to Railways”.
Distinguished Professor Buddhima Indraratna’s contributions to civil and geotechnical engineering, with particular focus on railway engineering, have been acknowledged through many national and international awards. He was honoured this year with the highly prestigious Ibarra Foundation’s 2024 International Civil Engineer Award. Considered as the Nobel equivalent in the field of Civil Engineering and awarded every 3-4 years, the Award was presented by the Queen of Spain during a formal ceremony in Madrid in May. Prof. Indraratna was the first Australian to receive this accolade. As well, the American GPS Scholar institution has just assessed Prof Indraratna as 5th in the world in the Lifetime Geotechnical Engineering Ranking due to his very high output of research and publications. This year too, on Australia Day 26th January, Prof. Buddhima was awarded the honour of Member of the Order of Australia for his significant contributions to engineering in Australia.
Prof Buddhima Indraratne_receiving Jose Ibarra 2024 International Civil Engineer Award from Queen of Spain
The Australian Geomechanics Society bestowed its highest honour of Life Membership in 2023. In 2023 also, Prof. Buddhima received the prestigious Sir Visveswaraya Prize for the most outstanding contribution to Civil Engineering outside the UK from the Institution of Civil Engineers, London. For his contributions to Sri Lanka as a UN expert, including landslides mitigation and post-tsunami rehabilitation works, Prof. Buddhima received the Sirimavo Bandaranaike Commendation, via the Ministry of Science and Technology, awarded by the Institution of Engineers, Sri Lanka. And these are only a few of the recognitions received by Prof. Indraratna – a noteworthy scion of Sri Lanka with Australia now his home.
Summary of the Talk
Professor Indraratna spoke on the challenges, commitments and developments for advances in transport infrastructure concentrating on his extensive work in Sri Lanka and Australia. The talk drew upon Prof. Indraratna’s internationally recognised leadership in the forefront of research, particularly in the area of rail networks of the future. He acknowledged the involvement of his PhD students at the University of Technology (UTS), Sydney, and earlier at the University of Wollongong in his research and innovation projects. Nearly 25% of the over 150 PhD students he supervises are of Sri Lankan origin.
The perspectives of a Circular Economy were dealt with and the drive to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals in the field of transport through research and technology. Being an expert in rail transport, railway construction and networks, Prof. Buddhima explained in layperson’s language the challenges in building excellent rail transport infrastructure in both Australia and Sri Lanka. He went through the problems that can cause derailments and the solutions that can be put in place.
CSA Meeting 2 June Talk by Prof Buddhima Indraratne_Slide showing Post Tsunami Rehab in Sri Lanka
What made the talk so fascinating was that Professor Buddhima articulated practical solutions such as the recycling of old tyres as building blocks to construct railway tracks. The attendees were privileged to witness the world’s first recycled rubber tyre rail track system invented by Professor Indraratna here in Australia. The discarded tyres were refilled using crushed glass, hard plastic shreds from recycled bottles, spent ballast from railway tracks, bricks, concrete waste from demolished buildings, and rubber tyre crumbs mixed with stones and gravel.
The audience was shown the work Prof. Buddhima had done in Sri Lanka after the December 2004 Tsunami in collaboration with his students in both Sri Lanka and Australia. Especially interesting was Prof. Buddhima’s solutions to the destruction of the rail tracks in the Colombo to Galle railway line caused by the tsunami pushing ocean mud onto the tracks, dislocating and destabilising them. A solution lay in nature, he showed in his presentation, as demonstrated by the fact that the coconut trees had not fallen unlike the buildings and human made structures in the path of the tsunami. The reason was that the root structure of the trees anchored them securely in the ground, and this bioengineering technique could be used as a solution to strengthen the foundation soil beside rail tracks by reinforcement and osmosis (suction pressure of the roots to absorb ground water). This prevents landslides as well because the root structure stabilises the ground through absorption of water by their roots, and this is used in countries like Canada. It is a cheaper solution than machine pumping water from the ground or stabilising the ground by other mechanical means. Prof. Indraratna had recommended this bioengineering solution to Sri Lankan Railways during reconstruction of the Colombo-Galle railway line.
CSA Meeting 2 June Talk by Prof Buddhima Indraratne_Introductory Slide
After Professor Indraratna’s talk, attendees socialised with him and his PhD students over refreshments, discussing further the innovative work being done by the Professor and his team. A number of the Sri Lankan PhD students as well as young engineers attended the talk, in addition to members of academia. They enjoyed the event, and were interested in talking to President Pauline on the CSA’s focus on the historical and cultural heritage of Sri Lanka, and picked up copies of the journal and Membership Application Forms.
Thanks go to Pauline Gunewardene and the CSA Committee for organising a very stimulating, fascinating and successful evening.
Prof Buddhima Indraratne and CSA President Pauline Gunewardene
CSA Meeting 2 June Talk by Prof Buddhima Indraratne_Audience
