You know the saying, “He never met a stranger?†That's Venkataraman Lakshmi. Passionate in his work as a professor in the University of Virginia Department of Engineering Systems and Environment, Lakshmi specializes in hydrologic sciences and is outgoing by nature; he's the kind of guy who can easily strike up a conversation with the person next to him on a plane. That very scenario is howNational Transportation Safety BoardchairRobert L. Sumwaltwound up lecturing in Lakshmi's Forefronts of Civil Engineering class at UVA. Lakshmi brings a different speaker each week to the graduate-level course. The chance meeting was three years ago, when the two men were traveling to Washington from Columbia, S.C. At the time, Lakshmi was on the faculty at the University of South Carolina. His office was in the building next to another one named for Sumwalt's grandfather, a civil engineering professor who became dean of the engineering school and later president of the university. Engineering, it turned out, was not Sumwalt's own passion in life, he told the UVA Engineering students and faculty who packed into Olsson Hall 104 on Jan. 30. He chose aviation, flying for commercial airlines for nearly 25 years. Now, he leads the five-member board overseeing the federal agency responsible for investigating accidents related to modes of transportation, from airplane crashes to pipeline spills.