Denise Leahy Full Interview

Geotechnical engineer Dr. Denise Leahy describes her post-secondary education at Laval and the Institute for Geotechnique in Trondheim, Norway. Her first engineering job was as a technician at the La Grande hydro-electric dam at Baie James, where, sue to security issues, women could not work outside the laboratory. After completing her PhD, she took a job at Geocon, an affiliate of Lavalin, where she was mentored by Lech Brzezinski, Getahun Haile, Heri Major, Benoît Demers and Les MacPhie. Much of her work involved the inspection, maintenance and restoration of mine tailings dams and she describes initiatives to consider acid mine drainage prevention and seismic loading for these structures. She describes initiatives to improve the quality of geotechnical engineering in Quebec, and her interactions with the Canadian Geotechnical Society and the Canadian Dam Association. She recalls the transition to computer-aided engineering, particularly the switch from manual drafting to AutoCad. She offers advice to high school students considering an engineering career and newly graduated Engineers-in-Training.