Derek Loftis

Dr. Derek Loftis serves as a Research Assistant Professor with the Center for Coastal Resources Management and the Virginia Commonwealth Center for Recurrent Flooding Resiliency at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS). His research centers on advancing hydrodynamic modeling to better understand and mitigate flood risks in vulnerable coastal regions. Dr. Loftis' research program at VIMS focuses on flooding resiliency and inundation risk assessment in 3 key areas:

1. He develops and refines hydrodynamic models and real-time flood forecasting systems
2. He evaluates model performance through deployment of next generation water level sensors, remote sensing technologies, and community-based data collection
3. He explores engineering approaches that strengthen resilience to future flooding while modeling ever-changing coastal risks to enhance resilience, help safeguard lives, and protect critical infrastructure

In addition to his research, Dr. Loftis teaches courses on remote sensing, geographic information systems, and coastal flooding resiliency at the Batten School of Coastal & Marine Sciences, and at William & Mary. Derek also leads the StormSense Project (a cutting-edge inundation monitoring effort deploying near-field remote sensors in Coastal Virginia), he helps manage Tidewatch (VIMS’ 36-hour storm tide forecasting service derived from tidal harmonic analysis of real-time tide gauge data), and has served as the science lead and liaison for Catch the King since its inception in 2017 (a community science project centered around annually mapping the highest astronomical tides using the free Sea Level Rise mobile app [iOS/Android]).