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Joum olEydrclogt 234 (2000) 113-ll5

HydrologywBrv.elsevier.co'n4ocate/jhy&ol

Obituary

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J.E. (Eamonn) Nash (192'7 -2000)

Ol rhe l , rh olAp, | 2000. dr lne dge of,e!e ] rhJee.Professor J. E. (Eamonn) Nash. died peacefully inGalway, Ireland, sunounded by his loving fanily.Hls intemational career in hydrology had spannedmore than four decades. With his passing, the hisha"d indeed Lhe Inlerna-ioni h)drologrcJ communi.)has tost not only one ofit's grert characrers and oigr-na1 thinkers b t also one of ihe main contibutors tothe science of hydrology as ii is undersrood and practrsed today.

Graduating in 1948, from Univelsity CollegeGalway (now the National Universily of heland,Calway) the "firsl seious job" of the young civilengineer liom Sligo was wiih rhe Irish Elecrricity

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Supply Boad (ESB). where he became involved inthe design of spillways and on various op€n channelhydraulics problems adsing in the design of hydro-elecL.rc power ( |zr ions lhere. 1 s innediare ,uperio-was Jim Dooge (iater Prot J. C. I. Dooge). Theirshared interest in hydrclogy sparked a friendshipand a collaboration in hy&ological research ardeducation which spanned more than five decades.

In 1950. Eamonn joined .he lrish covemment'sOffice of Public wo*s. in Dublin, which had justembarked on a national progranme of afierial drai-nage. designed to reduce flooding. as pan of it'sdeveldpment prcgramme for the Irish agriculturalsector. He inmediately directed his innate curiosiry

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and his rrbridled enthNiasm to what became a lifelong etro lo understxDd and explain lhe rature of thephysical processes governing the transformdtion ofrainJall to runoff. His work on crtchment ruodelling1ed to Lhe award of an M.E. degrce fiolrl hjs AlmaMaler in Galway, in 1955.

This inrerest in hydlologlcal nrodell g intensifiedwhen Eamonn moved to the Hydrx lics RcsearchStarion. in Wallingford. England, as Senior ResearchF e l l o $ . i n l 0 < 6 H i . : . h r e ' e m e , r i r ' . e \ e l o p i l g l efamo s Nash Crscade (equa1-Lesefloh) model wasr e ( o g r t . e d b ) r \ e . ' u J r d o f . h e l e o r o P n / e o ) . \ eInstiiution of Engineers, London, in 1958.

l r 1 0 6 0 . F a r t o ' q $ J , , e c o n d e d r o L . ( o t J . i rNigeria. as AssistaDt Dir€cror (Hy&ology) of theFederal Department of Inland Waterways, whiche n , . b l e d h n r o F \ p r d l r . f - J . r . a l e \ ! e e r c e .while helping an emerying Afiican country. It wasthere ihat he acquired an appreciation for the cflrcialrole of water resouces development in a third worldeconomy. a theme thal would figure proninently inthe latter par! ofhis career-

Reluming to Wallingford, in 1962, he was invohedin tlre planning and the esrablishment of rhe Hydrological Reseanh Unit (HRU), later to become tbeInstilute of Hydrology. and became it s first Head.Ho\rever, wishing to bl.il1g p his young family inheland, he stepped down to rctur io his old universilyin Galway. as a senior lecturer in engineeing hydnu-lics, when the oppoltuniry arose in October 1962.Wiih Dr. J. S. G. Mcculloch taking over as Directorof the Insritute ofHydrology, ir Walling{od. Eamonnretanredhis slrong links with the lnstiiute, as a consul-tanr. a fmitful collaboration that lasted morc thantwenly yea1s. His rcsearch intercsts centered mainlyon rairfltll runoff modelling, unit hydrograph theory,flood roirting, hydrological frequency analysis and theapplication of systems engineefilg in applied hydrology. He spearheaded the collaborarion between rhehstiture and the Iish Ofiice of Public Wo.ks in rheproduction of the Institute s Flood Studies Report oft 9 t 5 .

Back in Galway. following the award ofhis D.Sc.degep. n lo-0. he $a. apporn.ed prole*of In fng,-neering Hydrology. Subsequently, he was pe$uadedo b F c o n e r n ' o ' r e d i n , r n i v e r . i ) J d m i " i . r r r " r . r l

the capacity of Dean of Engireering. a decNioDwhich he subsequeDtly regrcued deeply. lts his

pe*onahly was most unsuited io rnivercity poliiicsxDd becruse it deflected hin from his rcseafch efforrs.

T| 1076. \F heJded , le . ew Deparnel r or FnEineeing Hydrology, rhe only snch depatmeDr ir rheLh univer , ry . ) . ren. co l r inu lB to ! o \ :dp , " r \ icecou| \e. i " r fu J necharrc. . hy, iaul ic . a , "d h)dr , in ; )to undergraduale engineefig st denis. while furberd( \e opin: J po. ,Fr du! e prugrJTl e i r L ; i lFe. i ' ;Hydrology. In 1979. he was rlre irNtigator a fotrDder(with the present witef) ofthe I emational Postgnduate Hydrology (M.Sc.l Courses, funded by IrishGovemment Aid- To date. 360 postgraduare studentsf rom 56'oL r rne ' r : \e rce: . prcd lor .he e cour .e, i1Galway, a sigrificart nunber ofthese going or to the?h.D. lel'el. In coopemtion with UNESCO/ANSTI.and also funded by Idsh Aid. he was insnunental inthe setting up of a similar prcgramme ofpostgraduatecowses rn waler resources engineeing at the U ver-sity ofDar es Salaam. in Txnzania, which is the mostsuccessful of its kind in Africa today.

Tn 1o85. orF of Lrmonn . lo lg lF d : Inb r ion\was realised when the sho er (tlnee month) intel1. , r io u dvdn, -d .or r "e. /wo k \op. $p.e .er Lp r rGalway. as an Iish Aid Progrmmle. which he cofounded with Prcfessors JimDooge. Conleth Cunnareand fie present wdter. Bet$een 1985 and 1997, 117senior hydrologists (practitionerc, rcse chers andaaadernic9 fion1 25 countries parricipated ir rhetotai of seven advanced courses/workshops held onRiver Flow Forccasting. testing the rainfall- noffmodels developed in calway on data from alt overthe world, ard in one such workshop on the theneofFlood xnd Drought Frcquency Analysis.

Overhis long carcer, Eanonn Nash acted vadouslyas consultant to many of the jntemational and nailonalagelcies, including UNESCO and WMO. He alsolect ' eJ. bJ i r \ i l r ron. : r , nJr) | 1 i \er . iu"s lhrorgnout the world. The start of his special felation withChinadatesbackto l9T8,whenhewasoDeof thef i ls lforeign hy&ologists. sent by WMO. to lecturc thercafter the Cultural Revolution.

In 1986, he was appointed an Honol?ty ProfessorofHo-Hai Univenity of Water Resources, in Nanjing.Other notable distinctiom include the award. irl1989. of the Inlenrational Hydrology Pdze of theInternational Associalion of Hydrological Sciences(IAHS) in rccognition to his contiburion io thedevelopment of analytical methods iri dererministjc

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catchment modelling. Only las! year (1999), he wasthe recipient of the Ven Te Chow Award in Hydrotogyof the American Sociery of Civil Engineers.

The author of a long lisr of publicaiions, frorn rhefirst, on Rood Routing. in 1955, ro the lasr. on theGeomorphological Unir Hydrograph, in 1999,Eamonn will also be remenbered for his Trojanwo* for nearly a quarrer of a century as an Edirorof the Joumal ofHydrology. Although a tough handson editor, many ackDowledge his pajnstaking etro sro guide authors. prticularly rhose less expe encedand those having a poor conmand of the Englishlarguage, to enable them io satisir his exactingcnteria for publication in the Joumal.

Eanonn Nash will also be renembered for his roteas Chairnan of the IAHSruNESCO Panel on Hy&o-logical Education which poduced the radical reporion The Education of Hydrologists", in 1990. TheWMO Bulletin Inter.r'iew of Ea.nonn. by Dr. H.Taba, published in 1994, provides a revealing insrsflinio his personality. his background and the moiiva-tion for much of his work.

A d€dicated family nan, Eamonn atways recos-nised that he could only have achieved whateversuccess he didmanageto achieveinhis cdeer rhroughtbe contrnuous support and underctanding of histllmily and that such success inevirably cane at aprice. rtr,1len he retircd, as Emerirus hofessor. laie

iD 1992. he was delemined not to iose our on hisgrandchildrer and to rake rime our also ro pu$ue hisother intellectual interests, such as Theology. Mathe-malics, AsFonomy, Persian An, Easiem Culrures rndPoetry, and to indulge in his passion for rhose tongwalks in his beloved "Bunen" (rhe kanric hills ofco.Clare), often with his grandchitdrcn in row.

A, rhe ne$s ol Idronn t \a.h: deJlh spreid. .hedeluge of condolences, aniving by e-mail, fltx andletter which flowed tuto calway from all over theworld, would have grearly surpdsed Earnonn. lt wasa geat confort to his wife. Deirdre, and to his rhreechildren. Paul, Carol and David, particularly as somany of those who wrot€ noted that some action orotber by Eamonn in the past had radically changedtbeir lives for .he betrer and that rhey had greattybenefiied fioln his influence and advice. He will begreatly missed by his family. and by his wide circle off iend. and col leasxec. Eamorl \ash w:. t tong bereme-nbered no. ony ior l r \ ach.e\emenr\ nhydrology but also for his deep intetlecrual honesty.his mischievous sense of humour. and especially forthe geruine warrnth ofhis personaliiy.

Kierar M. O Conno.Depatment of En?ineering Hylrclogl

National Unirersit! of lreland, GatuayGal &ay, Ireland