In This Story
Diana Veronez was working on flood hazards and water resource management in her native Brazil when the opportunity to study at George Mason University’s Flood Hazards Research Lab for her PhD proved too strong a current to resist. She packed up her husband and toddler son and took the plunge with a move to Northern Virginia.
“I am happy to find George Mason, which you can just feel has a higher educational level than other universities,” she said. “And the lab matches my interests perfectly.”
It was no accident that Veronez came here, considering that lab director Celso Ferreira, professor in the Civil, Infrastructure, and Environmental Engineering Department, also hails from Brazil. She reached out to him and found him receptive to the idea of working together.
“Diana stood out among a sea of applicants for her hands-on experience addressing real flood challenges in urban Brazil," said Ferreira. "From the moment she reached out, it was clear she brought not only technical expertise, but a deep personal commitment to community resilience. Her journey has enriched our lab and inspired our students.”
Veronez’s doctoral work evaluates urban drainage and flood hazards and how impacted stakeholders should work together to manage such risk. “They were not talking to each other and my effort was to help them share information and work together. So for instance, when there is construction, how they communicate around the environmental and water laws,” she said. She wrote a draft piece of legislation that was later adopted by a local Brazilian municipality.
Veronez uses a numerical model called the Hydrologic Engineering Center’s River Analysis System, developed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The model identifies areas likely to experience flooding and that require attention or mitigation measures. Based on these simulations, she analyzes both current and future conditions to predict potential flooding impacts. In addition, she applies different adaptation strategies to evaluate how they influence flood extent and community resilience. To assess and visualize results, she integrates the model outputs with geographic information system tools and Python coding to perform spatial analysis and automate data processing.
A current project at George Mason involves what she calls the translation of flood hazards to real life problems, such as when during flood events schools may become isolated when nearby roads are underwater, making it difficult for students to get to or leave school safely; she enjoys teaching these to undergraduate students. “The project connects real clients with our students and it’s really a translation for everybody—not just the students and not just the community, but also for our faculty,” she said. “When students see the problem in class at first, they can’t understand how to get to the solution but along the way they build confidence and see what they are applying for different adaptations and running different scenarios.”
Veronez says she has thrived, despite uprooting her family, because of a supportive culture at George Mason. “I'm a mom, a wife, and a professional and I want to do my best in each of those areas but also need to find time to care for myself. I have good people in my life here, especially Celso. My neighbors in the department have been great, and my colleagues are very supportive.”
Her research was recently recognized when Veronez won the poster contest at the American Water Resources Association National Capital Region Section Conference, with a poster on “Hybrid approach of adaptation solutions for coastal flood resilience in Maryland’s Chesapeake Bay using different future conditions.”