Dr. Frederick W. Williams, Director
of the Navy Technology Center for Safety and Survivability (NTCSS),
in the Naval Research Laboratory's (NRL's) Chemistry Division,
was recently honored by the Society of Fire Protection Engineers
(SFPE). He received the "1999 SFPE Fire Protection Person
of the Year Award" at a ceremony in Baltimore, Maryland,
on May 16, 1999.
This SFPE award was created in
1973 to recognize "significant achievement in the protection
of man and his environment from the ravages of unwanted fire
and an outstanding contribution to fire protection from outside
the membership of SFPE which is broad in scope and has apparent
lasting effects."
According to the award citation,
"the contributions of Fred Williams, both in terms of advancing
the science of fire protection engineering as a sponsor and program
manager, and individually conducting significant research, are
broad and far reaching. His efforts have had a direct impact
on Navy fire protection as well as the FPE community as a whole."
In addition to being the director
of the NTCSS, Dr. Williams is also Technical Director of the
ex-USS SHADWELL (LSD-15), the Navy's full scale Damage
Control Fire Fighting research ship. His current research
interests are in combustion dynamics, modeling and scaling.
Dr. Williams came to NRL as a
National Research Council Research Associate in 1965. In 1966,
he became a research chemist in the then Fuels Branch. As his
interest in the field of combustion grew, he became principal
investigator of the flame project titled "Cool Flames"
which led to his appointment as head of the Combustion
Section.
Dr. Williams' recognition of
combustion scaling problems and the realization of the terror
of shipboard fires, especially in submarines, led to his proposal
of the Fire I concept to NRL and the Naval Sea Systems Command.
Fire I is the worlds largest totally contained space fire test
facility, which was built at NRL in 1979 and later moved to NRL's
Chesapeake Bay Detachment.
In 1983, Dr. Williams proposed
the use of a retired Navy ship for fire research to the Chief
of Naval Operations. In 1985, the Secretary of the Navy made
NRL custodian of the ex-USS SHADWELL, a retired 457-ft.
landing ship that Dr. Williams arranged to move from the James
River, Virginia, to Mobile, Alabama, where it is now stationed.
Dr. Williams received his Ph.D.
in chemistry in 1965 from the University of Alabama. His numerous
awards include: the Navy Meritorious Civilian Service Award,
the Department of the Navy Award of Merit for Group Achievement,
NRL's Equal Employment Opportunity Award, NRL's E.O. Hulburt
Award and two Alan Berman Research Publication Awards. He has
published and presented over 750 papers and reports in the areas
of combustion, fire and atmosphere habitability.
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