David O. Prevatt M ’97, PhD ’98

He follows where the wind blows

When tornadoes strike, David Prevatt gets his Wind Hazard Damage Assessment Team into action. He and his civil engineering graduate and undergraduate students rush to sites around the country to investigate tornado damage done to buildings and homes. Through a Faculty Early Career Development research grant from the National Science Foundation, the team is working to develop engineering solutions for tornado-resilient and sustainable housing communities.
Prevatt is an associate professor in the Engineering School of Sustainable Infrastructure and Environment in the department of civil and coastal engineering at the University of Florida.
[pullquote align=’right’]You might have heard about him on NPR and NBC News.[/pullquote] Prevatt is a leading spokesman for improving construction and building guidelines. As a strong advocate for more federal funding to increase coordination and sustained research support in wind engineering, he testified before the U.S. House of Representatives’ Joint Hearing of Research and Technology Subcommittees and Committee on Science, Space and Technology.
The National Institute of Higher Education, Research, Science and Technology in his home country of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, awarded Prevatt a silver medal in recognition of his research. Prior to his appointment to the UF faculty, Prevatt was an assistant professor and director of the Wind Load Test Facility at Clemson. He’s a director of the American Association for Wind Engineering and member of the U.K. Wind Engineering Society.