Texas A&M Aerospace Engineering Professor Emeritus Thomas Strganac died on 30 September.
Strganac received his B.S. from North Carolina State University in aerospace engineering (1977), his M.S. in aerospace engineering from Texas A&M University (1980), and his Ph.D. in engineering mechanics from Virginia Tech (1987). He served as an engineer at NASA Wallops Flight Center from 1975 to 1982 and at NASA Langley Research Center from 1982 to 1989. Strganac then joined Texas A&M as a professor of aerospace engineering. His research interests focused on structural dynamics, nonlinear mechanics, and aeroelastic phenomena.
He internationally presented short courses on advanced flight tests and aeroelasticity, and he was the coauthor of Introduction to Flight Test Engineering and A Modern Course in Aeroelasticity. He served on the AIAA Lighter-Than-Air Systems Technical Committee (TC), the Balloon Systems and Technology TC, and the Structural Dynamics TC. Strganac also served as General Chair of the 1999 AIAA Structures, Structural Dynamics and Materials Conference and the 1996 AIAA Dynamics Specialists Conference. He was an Associate Fellow of AIAA and a registered Professional Engineer. Strganac served on the Editorial Board of AIAA’s Journal of Aircraft for 25 years.
He was affectionally known to his students as “Dr. Strag” and he will be remembered as an extraordinary mentor whose passion for teaching was infectious, and for his dedication to Texas A&M where his zeal for aerospace engineering extended beyond the classroom.
