American Red Cross San Diego/Imperial Counties Chapter Honors SDSC

Published 05/02/2006



From left: Douglas Greer, Vishu Nandigam, Roger Unwin, Jerry Rowley, Vijay Samalam, Chaitan Baru, Red Cross CEO Jeffrey C. Wiemann, Red Cross board members Jaime Barton and Mark A. Koob.

SDSC researchers who helped organize and manage missing persons data during Hurricane Katrina were honored with a special plaque by The American Red Cross San Diego/Imperial Counties Chapter.

Local Red Cross CEO Jeffrey C. Wiemann, CEO presented the plaque to SDSC Executive Director Vijay Samalam and project leader Chaitan Baru at the Chapter's board of director's meeting, April 26.

Baru's team collaborated with the Red Cross and other rescue organizations to make it easier for persons to locate missing loved ones by creating an amalgamated list containing thousands of names from a number of individual data searches that sprung when the disaster occurred.

The SDSC Katrina team volunteered its time during the storm's aftermath. It included specialists in data management, data storage, high performance computing and Web development. Jerry Rowley, Lab Director, Advanced Database Projects Lab coordinated the daily activities at SDSC, working closely with database experts, Vishu Nandigam, Roger Unwin and Douglas Greer.

Presenting the award to SDSC was Jeffrey C. Wiemann, CEO along with board members Jaime Barton and Mark A. Koob.