Senior Health Physicist heading to International Atomic Energy Agency

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He’s kept the McMaster nuclear community safe for close to 20 years, and now he’s taking his talents to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, Austria.

Dave Tucker, McMaster’s Senior Health Physicist, will finish up at McMaster at year’s end, and will start the new year embarking on his new career as head of the Radiation Safety Technical Services Unit at the IAEA, where he’ll be responsible for promoting safety and disseminating services for IAEA staff.

While it’s an “opportunity of a lifetime,” it wasn’t an easy decision for Tucker who has both a professional and personal connection to McMaster.

“I’ve earned two degrees here, spent the majority of my career here, had the privilege of teaching here, and even got married here.  McMaster is a huge part of my life, as are the people with whom I’ve had the good fortune to work.”

When Tucker returned to Mac from Chalk River in 1998, it was as the Director of Risk Management, heading up both Environmental & Occupational Health Support Services (EOHSS) and Radiation Safety.  Shortly after, the divisions split, and he became the University’s Senior Health Physicist and Radiation Safety Manager, responsible for radiation safety, licensing, and emergency preparedness.

Rob Baker, vice-president, research, says Tucker’s contributions to the University are enormous, both from a safety and reputational standpoint.

“Dave, quite literally, transformed McMaster’s health physics department, moving it to a world-class systematic enabler of safe and compliant research,” he says, adding that so much of the University’s success in nuclear operations, radiation science, and medical isotope R&D and production, was influenced by Dave’s expertise.

In addition to his primary role, the University and the wider community have benefitted from Tucker’s professionalism and knowledge.  He’s served on a number of successful negotiating teams and has been the public face for McMaster on radiation safety – liaising with the City’s Emergency Management Office, Hamilton’s Fire, Police and Paramedic Services, Hamilton Public Health, as well as the Ontario Office of the Fire Marshall and Emergency Management, and Health Canada’s Radiation Protection Bureau.

Tucker is looking forward to putting the skills he honed at McMaster to work at the international level at the IAEA, whose mandate is to be the world’s centre for cooperation in the nuclear field and to promote the safe, secure and peaceful use of nuclear technologies for sustainable development.

“It was such a privilege to be at McMaster during the nuclear renaissance,” he says.  “The work that’s happening here now is so critically important and it’s been such a special opportunity to support it.”

Baker added, “not only did Dave play a pivotal role in the expansion of the University’s nuclear facilities and infrastructure, he built and mentored an outstanding team of radiation safety experts, and for that we thank him.”

A search is currently underway for Tucker’s successor.

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