Professor Emeritus, Civil Engineering
University of Canterbury
1930-2025

Professor Wood was born in 1930 and received a BE (Honours) from the University of New Zealand in 1954. He went on to receive an ME in Hydrology (1958) and a PhD in Fluid Mechanics (1966) both from the University of New South Wales. After a brief stint with the Commonwealth Department of Works, Canberra, in the hydrologic and hydraulic design of dams, he returned to academic positions initially at the University of New South Wales and then the University of Canterbury. His sabbaticals included research at the Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge and as the Mary Shepard Upson Distinguished Visiting Professor at Cornell University, USA. Appointed Emeritus Professor, after his retirement in 1993, he remained committed to students, research and lending his professional engineering expertise to consultants and government agencies. He was a Fellow of the Institution of Professional Engineers New Zealand, and one of only a few civil engineers that are Fellows of the Royal Society of New Zealand. In 2010 he was elected to Fellowship of the Australasian Fluid Mechanics Society for his contributions to the understanding of multiphase and free-surface flows.

Ian Wood was a distinguished hydraulician with outstanding contributions in fluid mechanics and its applications in solving engineering problems. His publications of around 70 scientific papers include many seminal contributions in stratified flow, air entrainment of high-speed water flows, dispersion in open channel flows and the theory of jets and plumes. The IAHR Hydraulic Structures Design Monograph: Air Entrainment in Free-Surface Flows (1991), and the book Ocean Disposal of Wastewater (1993) are both classics that are widely used by the research community and industry worldwide.  Prof Wood was the recipient of the highly coveted IAHR Harold Schoemaker Award (1989), the ASCE Hunter Rouse Hydraulic Engineering Award (1992), and the IAHR Selim Yalin Lifetime Achievement Award (2011). He has delivered numerous invited and keynote lectures at international conferences and institutions including the University of Cambridge, Cornell University, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Scripps Oceanographic Institution, the University of Queensland, Asian Institute of Technology, the University of Hong Kong, and Hohai University. 

Professor Wood was engineering adviser to firms in New Zealand and overseas on investigations that include model studies of rivers, dam spillways, harbors and surge tank penstock complexes, and thermal power stations; and the analysis and design of ocean and river outfalls, including Sydney, Christchurch, Waimakiriri and Dunedin. He served as an Expert Witness on numerous occasions and on several Water Rights Tribunals.

Professor Wood was a teacher of the highest caliber who dedicated his career to the support and mentorship of students, young researchers and early career professionals. His mentees span the globe from California to Europe to Australasia and many of his PhD students occupy Full Professorship positions at prestigious universities. Ian Wood taught a range of water related courses at the University of Canterbury for 23 years from 1971 until his retirement in 1993. He had a major influence on hundreds of practicing civil engineers both in New Zealand and overseas. His reputation drew both local and international students to undertake postgraduate research under his supervision and these students invariably held him in the highest esteem. 

To many of us, Ian Wood was an exceptional mentor who was supportive as well as challenging in animated discussions on fluid flows. He would confront us with incisive physical insights and bold questions – pressing for clear explanations - and contributing with simple models or arguments of unusual clarity. He relished such discussions, always conducted with rigor and always with courtesy and good humor.  His ideas (e.g. on advected thermals) often steered research in a totally new direction. He was a fantastic, warm, perceptive human being with a modesty and great sense of humor who upheld the highest ethical and academic standards. 

Professor Ian Wood was a long-standing member of IAHR and of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Hydraulic Research. Many IAHR colleagues have benefited from his advice and time, particularly regarding integration of education, research and hydraulic engineering practice. He will be sorely missed by the IAHR family and fondly remembered not only for his world class teaching and research endeavors, but also for his humanistic and welcoming personality, embracing all walks of life.

Joseph Hun-wei Lee    
Past President, IAHR
President, Macau University of Science and Technology, Macau, China

Peter A. Davies
Past Editor, IAHR Research Publications
Professor Emeritus, University of Dundee, UK

Contributors:
Past Doctoral Students: 
Richard A. Denton. California, USA
Susan Gaskin, McGill University, Canada 
Roger Nokes, University of Canterbury, NZ.

Colleagues:
Harindra J. Fernando, University of Notre Dame, USA
Mohamed S. Ghidaoui, Hongkong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China
Peter Goodwin, University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, USA
Vladimir I. Nikora, University of Aberdeen, UK

Prof N E Kotsovinos (Democritus University of Thrace), Dr K Saini (Patras University) and Prof. I Wood shown at the NATO Advanced Research Workshop "Recent Research Advances in the Fluid Mechanics of Turbulent Jets and Plumes" held at Viana do Castelo, Portugal, June 1993. Photograph taken by Peter Davies, UK

 Condolence messages

If you wish to leave a condolence message please contact condolences@iahr.org 

It is so hard to capture the essence of the man in a few words on a page but I am sure we all have a much more expansive and intimate picture of Ian than can possibly be conveyed via the written word. For such an unassuming man he was a giant in the engineering and research communities of which he was a part, and to his students, his postgrads in particular, he was an inspiration and a treasured mentor.

Emeritus Professor Roger Nokes
University of Canterbury, New Zealand 

His works on stratified flow, his IAHR monograph on air entrainment, and breakthroughs in jets and plumes were classics in the field of hydraulics. And he was always supportive of young researchers. A really fine gentlemen and distinguished engineer/scientist.

Joseph Hun-wei Lee 
President, Macau University of Science and Technology, Macau, China
IAHR Past President

I am deeply saddened by  Ian Wood's passing. I fondly remember studying his book, "Ocean Disposal of Wastewater," co-authored with Robert G. Bell and David L. Wilkinson, during my doctoral research. At that time, Wood's work was almost synonymous with the subject for me, along with his many valuable papers on jets and related topics.

Michele Mossa
Full Professor of Hydraulics
Polytechnic University of Bari DICATECh

When I met Ian in 1993, he was already retiring, but thereafter we were in touch occasionally, though each meeting was greatly impactful.                                                                                                            

Joe Harindra Fernando, IDEM
University of Notre Dame, USA

 Related

"A sense of good fortune" - 1993 CE Chronicle Uni Canterbury Ian Wood Article