Gobichettipalayam Vasudevan "G. V." Loganathan (April 8, 1954 – April 16, 2007) was an Indian-American engineer, who, at the time of his death, was a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental engineering, part of the College of Engineering at Virginia Tech, United States.

Life and career

Loganathan was from Karatadipalayam, Gobichettipalayam in Erode district in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. He completed his Bachelor of Engineering at PSG College of Technology, Coimbatore affiliated to the University of Madras in 1976. He later did his M. Tech. at Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur and received a doctorate from Purdue University, United States studying under Dr. Jack Delleur. His dissertation was titled Multiple objective planning of land/water interface in medium-size cities. G. V. Loganathan joined Virginia Tech on December 16, 1981 for his first job teaching civil and environmental engineering courses, and continued to teach at Virginia Tech until his death in 2007. His work focused on the areas of hydrology and hydraulic networks (pipelines). He co-authored a number of publications and books which have been particularly useful in the field of municipal water supply distribution networks, such as the 2002 AWWA book Prioritizing Main Replacement and Rehabilitation which has been used by organizations such as East Bay Municipal Utility District. He received several Virginia Tech honors, including the Outstanding Faculty Award, the Dean's Award for Excellence in Teaching, and Faculty Achievement Award for Excellence in Civil Engineering Education. He also served as a member of the Virginia Tech faculty senate and a counselor in the Virginia Tech honor court. He was an active member of the American Society of Civil Engineers and Associate Editor of the Journal of Hydrologic Engineering, with expertise in the area of stochastic hydrology. His work at the university also involved collaboration with the National Weather Service office located on campus. Loganathan also served on the American Society of Civil Engineers' Environmental and Water Resources Institute's Trenchless Installation of Pipelines Technical Committee, Environmental and Water Resources Systems Technical Committee and acted as vice chair for the Operations Management Technical Committee.

Death

One week after turning 53, Loganathan was among the 32 people killed by a gunman in the Virginia Tech shooting on April 16, 2007. Loganathan taught an Advanced Hydrology class in Norris Hall's Room 206. On April 16, 2007, Seung-Hui Cho entered Norris 206, chained the doors shut and opened fire; Loganathan was Cho's first target. Of the thirteen registered students in Loganathan's class, nine were killed (Brian Bluhm, Matthew Gwaltney, Jeremy Herbstritt, Jarrett Lane, Partahi Lumbantoruan, Daniel O'Neil, Juan Ramon Ortiz, Julia Pryde and Waleed Shaalan) and two more were injured. Another male student survived after being missed by a single shot.

Honors

Selected publications

Loganathan published at least 62 papers, almost all in peer-reviewed journals. He also was a contributing author to at least one published book. This is a partial list of Loganathan's published articles and books: