Wilfred George Kenneth Fleming (known as Ken) was an influential

piling A deep foundation is a type of foundation that transfers building loads to the earth farther down from the surface than a shallow foundation does to a subsurface layer or a range of depths. A pile or piling is a vertical structural elemen ...

engineer and former chairman of the Federation of Piling Contractors.

Early life and education

Born in

Maguiresbridge Maguiresbridge is a small village in County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland. The village is named after the bridge over the Colebrooke River, first built by the local Maguire family about 1760. The village is 8 miles from Enniskillen and 3 miles fr ...

County Fermanagh County Fermanagh ( ; ) is one of the thirty-two counties of Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the six counties of Northern Ireland. The county covers an area of 1,691 km2 (653 sq mi) and has a population of 61,805 ...

Ken Fleming was the son of a

Church of Ireland The Church of Ireland ( ga, Eaglais na hÉireann, ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Kirk o Airlann, ) is a Christian church in Ireland and an autonomous province of the Anglican Communion. It is organised on an all-Ireland basis and is the secon ...

minister. In July 1945, he won the Seale Scholarship to

Portora Royal School Portora Royal School located in Enniskillen, County Fermanagh, Northern Ireland, was one of the public schools founded by the royal charter in 1608, by James I, making it one of the oldest schools in Ireland at the time of its closure. Origina ...

. He graduated from Queen's University Belfast (1955) and became an assistant lecturer, later being awarded a PhD in 1958.

Working life

In 1958 Ken Fleming joined J. Laing and Sons (in Mill Hill, London, NW7). When Laing’s joined up to form McKinney Foundations, Fleming was involved as a technical advisor for the piling foundations for London's

Centre Point Centre Point is a building in Central London, comprising a 34-storey tower; a 9-storey block to the east including shops, offices, retail units and maisonettes; and a linking block between the two at first-floor level. It occupies 101–103 ...

. He also travelled to America where he spent time with company founder Jack McKinney who encouraged his interest in developing improved piling techniques. McKinney Foundations was bought by Cementation Foundations in 1968 and Ken Fleming became chief engineer. At Cementation, Fleming was involved in the development of a series of new systems for improving the receptiveness of the ground to secure piles and to provide reliable information on the settlement of piles. Ken Fleming created the "Cemset" system which forecasts pile settlement under load. He became chairman of the Federation of Piling Contractors, and in 1975 chairman and founder member of the Federation of Piling Specialists. In 1985 he was the lead author of Piling Engineering,Piling Engineering By Ken Fleming, Austin Weltman, Keith Elson, Mark Randolph at Google Books
/ref> which has become an industry standard reference book. The third edition of Piling Engineering, still containing much of Fleming's original material, published in September 2008. Fleming influenced European piling through the European Federation of Foundation Contractors. He disagreed with parts of the Eurocode EC7. Among other objections he believed it had fundamental technical flaws in relation to pile testing. The

British Standards Institution The British Standards Institution (BSI) is the national standards body of the United Kingdom. BSI produces technical standards on a wide range of products and services and also supplies certification and standards-related services to busines ...

awarded Fleming its Distinguished Service award in 1992. In 1999 the British Geotechnical Society honoured him with the prestigious Skempton Medal for his lifelong contribution to geotechnical engineering. In 2000 the

British Geotechnical Association The British Geotechnical Association is a learned 'Associated Society' of the Institution of Civil Engineers,ICE Associated Societies newsletter, Spring/Summer 2011 (Accessed: 19 July 2013) based in London, England, and a registered UK charity (N ...

joined with Cementation (now part of

Skanska Skanska AB () is a multinational construction and development company based in Sweden. Skanska is the fifth-largest construction company in the world according to ''Construction Global'' magazine. Notable Skanska projects include renovation of t ...

) to mark Fleming's contribution to geotechnical engineering by inaugurating the Fleming Award. This international award is presented annually for excellence in geotechnical design and construction. A visiting Professor at Queen's University Belfast, Fleming was also a prominent figure in the

Institution of Civil Engineers The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) is an independent professional association for civil engineers and a charitable body in the United Kingdom. Based in London, ICE has over 92,000 members, of whom three-quarters are located in the UK, whi ...

External links

Obituary from The New Civil Engineer Magazine

Details of the Cementation Skanska Fleming Award in memory of Ken Fleming

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fleming, Ken 1933 births 2001 deaths British civil engineers Academics of Queen's University Belfast Alumni of Queen's University Belfast Engineers from County Fermanagh