Joseph Comerford

Dr. Joseph Bernard Comerford (18 December 1958 – 18 August 2000) was a British engineer and one of the UN's leading irrigation experts. He played a critical role in shaping the international humanitarian response to the Great Lakes Crisis at one of its most turbulent moments. He was responsible for providing clean water and sanitation to over a million people.

On 18 August 2000, Comerford was found dead in his hotel room while on a mission, having been sent to the Congo ahead of 5,000 UN peacekeeping troops to assess structural damage caused by an occupying force of soldiers backed by neighbouring Rwanda.

Early life and education

Comerford was born in Liverpool, the son of Bernard and Elizabeth Comerford. He grew up in Rossendale and later in Bury near Manchester with his two sisters Anne and Catherine and his brother Michael Comerford.

He studied engineering (M.A.) at the University of Cambridge, and later earned a second master in Irrigated Agriculture and Development from the University of Southampton and a certificate in development economics from the University of London. He completed his doctorate in disaster management at the University of Bristol before getting an MBA at INSEAD (Institut Européen d'Administration des Affaires) in Fontainebleau. He was described by members of the 1993 MBA class at INSEAD as "someone who used his MBA to dedicate his life, which he ultimately sacrificed, to humanitarian service. He exemplified the best ideals of vision, leadership and courage inherent in an INSEAD education." In 2010, Comerford was honoured in memoriam as one of "50 alumni who changed the world" at INSEAD's 50th anniversary celebration. His leadership led to one of INSEAD's first course offerings in ethical development, "Business and Development in the Third World."

Career After graduating from INSEAD, Comerford worked with NGOs and UN organisations such as Oxfam, UNDP and UNHCR in hazardous regions, including Sudan, Liberia, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), Rwanda and East Timor. A Kenyan government pathologist concluded from broken bones in his neck that he must have been murdered, whereas a report commissioned by the UNDP under Mark Malloch Brown said it could also have been suicide. As a result of all this criticism, the General Assembly decided to introduce the new UN internal justice system.

Publications Comerford, J.B., Martin, J, Blockley, D.I., & Davis, J.P. (1989). "On Aids to Interpretation in Monitoring Civil Engineering Systems," Proc. IABSE Colloquium on Expert Systems in Civil Eng., International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering, Zürich, Switzerland, pp. 219–228. Comerford, J.B., Blockley, D.I., & Davis, J.P. (1989), A knowledge-based system to interpret results from pulse-echo pile integrity tests, Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers, 90:1, pp. 189–204 Comerford, J.B.Blockley, D.I., & Davis, J.P. (1991), 'The interpretation of pile integrity tests through intelligent knowledge based systems' ICE – Part 1, vol 90, pp. 189–204. Comerford, J.B., & Stone, J.R. (1992), 'AI in risk control'. in D.I. Blockley (ed.), Engineering Safety. McGraw-Hill, pp. 402–426. Comerford, J.B., Salvaneschi, P., Lazzari, M., Bonaldi, P., Ruggeri, G., Fanelli, M., Giuseppetti, G., & Mazzà, G. (1992). 'The role of AI technology in the management of dam safety': the DAMSAFE system. Dam Engineering, 3, 4, pp. 265–275. Comerford, J.B., Lazzari, M., Pina, D., & Salvaneschi, P. (1992). 'An AI approach to the integration of engineering knowledge: water resources case studies', Proceedings, AIENG 92: 7th International Conference on Applications of Artificial Intelligence in Engineering, Univ. of Waterloo, Ontario, July 1992. Cadei, M., Comerford, J.B., Lazzari, M., & Salvaneschi, P. (1992), Una famiglia di sistemi basati su conoscenza per la valutazione della sicurezza di opere diingegneria civile, 31° Congresso Annuale dell'Associazione Italiana per l'Informatica e il Calcolo Automatico, Torino, Italy, 21–23 October 1992, pp. 67–71 Comerford, J.B., Lazzari, M., Ruggeri, G., Salvaneschi, P., Fanelli, M., Giuseppetti, G., & Mazzà, G. (1993). 'Causal models and knowledge integration in system monitoring'. IABSE REPORTS, pp. 331–331. Comerford, J.B. & Blockley, D.I. (1993). 'Managing safety and hazard through dependability' Int. J. Struct. Safety, 12, 1, pp. 21–33.