Sociedad Mexicana de Ingeniería Geotécnica

Mexican Society of Geotechnical Engineering (SMIG)
Valle de Bravo No.19 
Col. Vergel de Coyoacán 
Tlalpan 14340 
México, D.F 
México 

Tel:  +52 (55) 56.77.37.30
Fax: +52 (55) 56.79.36.76

Email: [email protected]
Website: http://smig.org.mx/   

Presidente: Ricardo Enrique Ortiz Hermosillo ([email protected])
Vicepresidenta: Natalia del Pilar Parra Piedrahita ([email protected])
Secretario: Miguel Ángel Mánica Malcom ([email protected])

History

On November 27, 1957, the Mexican Society for Soil Mechanics - SMMS (now the Mexican Society of Geotechnical Engineering - SMIG) was founded  by ten young engineers.  The founding members, headed by Professor Leonardo Zeevaert Wiechers, were:

Nabor Carrillo Flores
José A. Cuevas
Eulalio Juárez Badillo
Héctor Calderón Hermosa
Juan José Correa Rachó
Manuel González Flores
Enrique Ríos Lazcano
Enrique Tamez González
Francisco Zamora Millán

Since then, its main purpose has been predominantly scientific and its aim to spread the knowledge on soil mechanics and geotechnical engineering through education, research and professional practice. This purpose has been the basis for the Society's work for the last 60 years. Today, the Society has mainly a national coverage with near to 300 members, the majority located in Mexico City and in 6 chapters (regional delegations), including the states of:

Occidente
Michoacán
Puebla
Querétaro
Tabasco
Veracruz

The Board of Directors is made up of 9 members which, for the period 2019-2020 (BD-SMIG 19/20), are:

President - PhD. Moisés Juárez Camarena
Vice-President - MSc. María Guadalupe Olín Montiel
Secretary - PhD. Ricardo E. Ortíz Hermosillo
Treasurer -  MSc. Héctor Valverde Reyes
Members of the Board:
- MSc. Renata Alejandra González Rodríguez.
- MSc. Héctor de la Fuente Utrilla.
- MSc. Félix Sosa Contreras.
- PhD. Sergio Antonio Martínez Galván.
- MSc. Gerson Vázquez Salas.

The 25 past Presidents were:

Leonardo Zeevaert Wiechers (1957-1968) 
Raúl J. Marsal Córdoba (1969-1970) 
Alfonso Rico Rodríguez (1971-1972) 
Enrique Tamez González (1973-1974) 
Guillermo Springall Cáram (1975-1976) 
Edmundo Moreno Gómez (1977-1978) 
Carlos J. Orozco y Orozco (1979-1980) 
Luis Vietez Utesa (1981-1982) 
Gabriel Moreno Pecero (1983-1984) 
Raúl López Roldán (1985-1986) 
J. Raúl Flores Berrones (1987-1988) 
Luis M. Aguirre Menchaca (1989-1990) 
Gabriel Auvinet Guichard (1991-1992) 
Luis B. Rodríguez González (1993-1994) 
Raúl V. Orozco Santoyo (1995-1996) 
Alberto Jaime Paredes (1997-1998) 
Jorge Orozco Cruz (1999-2000)
Juan J. Schmitter M. del Campo (2001-2002)
Héctor Valverde Landeros (2003-2004)
José Francisco Fernández Romero (2005-2006)
Rigoberto Rivera Constantino (2007-2008)
Walter Iván Paniagua Zavala (2009-2010)
Juan de Dios Alemán Velazquez (2011-2012)
David Yañez Santillán (2013-2014)
Raúl Aguilar Becerril (2015-2016)
Carlos Alberto Torres Álvarez (2017-2018

In order to achieve its goals, the society organizes conferences, seminars, symposiums, workshops and practical courses. It also publishes proceedings of the technical meetings and events. Currently, there are more than 60 titles available from the Society and more than 100 titles have been published since the 1950's. A bulletin is delivered bimonthly to the members and in 1999 the Society started its own web site at: http://www.smig.org.mx, which includes the bulletin and other information about the society's activities and new publications.

The publications and technical meetings are related to topics such as:
- Geotechnical Site Characterization.
- Soil Dynamics and Seismic Geotechnical Engineering.
- Soil-Structure Interaction.
- Non Saturated Soils.
- Soft Soils.
- Cracking of Soils.
- Aging of Soils.
- Topics on Environmental Geotechnics.
- Dam Engineering and Tailing Dams.
- Tunneling.
- Slopes and Geosynthetics.
- Marine soils and Offshore Geotechnical Engineering.
- Soil Improvement.
- Groundwater seepage.
- Rock Mechanics.
- Guidelines for: Piles and Piers Design, Geotechnical Exploration, Soil Testing
- Preservation of Historic Sites.
- Workshops notes on: Foundation Design and Construction according with the Mexico City Code, Piles and Piers Testing, Environmental Geotechnics, Computation Tools for Geotechnical Engineering.

Every two years, in the third week of November, the Society prepares four mayor technical meetings:

- The National Meeting of Soil Mechanics ( to date this meeting has been held 29 times)
- The Nabor Carrillo* Lecture (so far this lecture has been held 24 times)
- The Leonardo Zeevaert* Lecture (fourth lecture)
- The Raúl J. Marsal* Lecture(eighth lecture)
- The Eulalio Juárez Badillo* Lecture (second lecture)
- The National Meeting of Soil Mechanics instructors (20 times)

*(To honor professors Nabor Carrillo-Flores, Leonardo Zeevaert, Raúl J. Marsal, and Eulalio Juarez Badillo  - the more prominent pioneers of the Mexican Soil Mechanics). 

In order to encourage the participation of its young geotechnical members, the Society has established the Manuel González-Flores** Award, in three areas: Education, Research and Professional Practice. The award is granted to three young engineers, providing that they are younger than 40 years, with outstanding careers in one of the aforementioned areas, and is scheduled every two years, back to 1990. The ceremony takes place during the National Meeting of Soil Mechanics. The award winners were:

2018
Education: Hiram Arroyo Chávez.
Research: Jesús Sánchez Guzmán.
Professional Practice: Adrián Luis Hernández García.

2016
Education: M. en C. Miguel Ángel Figueras Corte
Research: Dra. Claudia Marcela González Blandón
Professional Practice: M. en I. Guillermo Clavellina Miller

2014
Education: M. en C. María Guadalupe Olin Montiel
Research: M. en I. Sergio Antonio Martínez Galván
Professional Practice: M. en I. Alfredo Cirión Arana

2012
Research: Dra. Alexandra Ossa López
Professional Practice: M. en I. Oscar Luna

2010
Education: Dr. Ricardo Enrique Ortiz Hermosillo
Research: Dra. Norma Patricia López Acosta. and Dr. Eduardo Botero Jaramillo
Professional Practice: M. en I. Oscar Sergio Aguilar Pérez

2008
Professional Practice: Juan Paulin Aguirre

2006
Education: Darío Hurtado Maldonado
Research: Juan Manuel Mayoral Villa
Professional Practice: Anastacio Pérez Rivera

2004
Education: Reginaldo Hernández Romero
Research: Gerardo Silva González Pacheco
Professional Practice: Aarón Sámano Álvarez

2002
Education: Teresa López Lara
Research: José Luis Rangel Nuñez
Professional Practice: David Yañez Santillán

2000
Education: María De La Luz Pérez Rea
Research: Paul Garnica Anguas
Professional Practice: José Francisco Fernández Romero

1998
Education: José Medina Mendoza
Research: Víctor Manuel Taboada Urtuzuástegui
Professional Practice: Martin Ramírez Reynaga

1996
Education: José Luis Castillo Soto
Research: Xiangyue Li Liu
Professional Practice: Walter Iván Paniagua Zavala

1994
Education: Margarita Puebla Cadena
Research: Venancio Trueba López
Professional Practice: Alfredo Sánchez Gómez

1992
Education: Ricardo Padilla Velázquez
Research: Eduardo Rojas González
Professional Practice: Alberto Porras López

1990
Education: José Alfredo Zepeda Garrido
Research: Efraín Ovando Shelley
Professional Practice: Luis Enrique Montañez Cartaxo

1988
Education: Manuel Mendoza López
Research: Alberto Jaime Paredes
Professional Practice: Carlos Gutiérrez Sarmiento
 
**(To honor Manuel Gonzalez-Flores, one of the founders of the SMMS and a very creative geotechnical engineer, inventor of the "Control Piles System").

Besides the National Technical Meetings, Symposia and Conferences, the Mexican Society for Soil Mechanics has hosted the following international conferences:

First Pan-American Conference (Mexico City 1959)
Seventh International Conference (Mexico City 1969)
Tenth Pan-American Conference (Guadalajara 1995)
First Pan-American Conference on the Teaching-Learning Process of Geotechnical Engineering (Oaxaca 2000)
The Sixteenth Pan-American Conference that will be held in Cancun, Mexico on November 2019

Since its foundation in 1957, the Mexican Society of Soil Mechanics (SMMS) has been an active member of the ISSMGE.