Back in the USA. This year, the 39th OMAE, OMAE2020 is back to USA after travelling year-by-year around the world in several continents. OMAE is one of the most successful conferences organized by ASME with constant volunteer support also from all continents. It has an increasing number of participants always recharged with young professionals from Industry, Government and Academia (the three indispensable branches).
It is never too much to stress the importance of the volunteers’ support, not only the Executive Committee and the Symposium Coordinators and the various ad hoc committees, but also the Topic and Session Organisers and the authors and co-authors. This year they were needed to dedicate an extra work owing to the implementation of a new software for the reviewing process of the conference. Due to the never foreseen Covid-19 crisis that the world is facing, OMAE calls these volunteers again to face, for the first time in history, an all virtual conference. ASME has provided a consistent software structure and trained crew, but bright and good faith professionals are needed to turn the gears. There will be live and recorded papers. There are 762 final technical papers to be presented and additional 51 presentations only.
Besides the usual 11 symposia, OMAE2020 will also offer seven short courses, along with Monday’s Opening Ceremonies featuring three keynote lectures from Academia and Industry, to be given by Professor David Lane, Dr. Alana Duerr, and Mr. Thomas S. Chance; two morning plenary lectures, to be given by Professor John Ringwood and Professor Michael Bernitsas. The Digitalization Workshop will run in parallel with the symposia, keenly recognizing how digitalization is changing our offshore world, maritime projects, operations and life extension.
A lot of acknowledgements should be directed to Prof. Ronald Yeung and Prof. Manhar Dhanak for their admirable enthusiasm.
Also, a lot of thanks goes to the present EC for their trendsetter efforts. The support and dedication given by Stacey Cooper at ASME and the Sea-to-Sky team has been invaluable.
I hope you will have a great time at OMAE 2020 safely at home, but still in contac with a lot of friends all over the world by keeping the networking alive.
Virtual welcome to all.
Prof. Antonio C. Fernandes
Technical Program Chair, OMAE 2020
Professor at the Ocean Engineering Program of COPPE/UFRJ, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Coordinator of LOC (Laboratório de Ondas e Correntes - Waves and Currents Laboratory)
Director for International Affairs of LabOceano
Americas' representative in the ITTC’s Executive Committee