Honouring the Late Professor Wilson Tang

We received news of Professor Wilson Tangs passing with profound sadness during the preparation of APSSRA2012. Prof. Tang had a distinguished academic career in which he made significant contributions in the areas of safety and reliability analysis in civil engineering, particularly in geotechnical engineering. He is not only a pioneer in our research area, but he is well respected and loved by many colleagues and friends in our community for his humble and distinguished scholarship.

To honour his lifetime contributions, a Special Plenary Session consisting of invited presentations from his past students was organized by his close friend and colleague Professor Alfredo H.-S. Ang. The organizers are most appreciative of the efforts undertaken by Professor Ang. The organizers are also exceedingly proud to announce the establishment of the Wilson Tang Best Paper Award in honor of the late Professor Wilson Tang and his lifetime achievements in our community. This award will be presented for the first time in APSSRA2012. It is conferred to recognize the outstanding quality of a paper presented in APSSRA2012. The award will be presented during the symposium.

We are very grateful to Professor Tang’s wife, Ms Bernadette Tang for her gracious permission to host the Special Plenary Session and to name the award after our pioneer, friend and colleague. We hope that these initiatives would keep Professor Wilson Tang and his achievements in our mind and encourage young colleagues to follow and emulate his research excellence and scholarship.