Abdul Kazi, Aberdeen Proving Ground atomic physicist, dies

Jacques Kelly, Baltimore Sun
·3 min read

Abdul Kazi, an Aberdeen Proving Ground atomic physicist who survived World War II as a child in Germany, died of an apparent aneurysm March 6 at his Jarrettsville home. He was 89.

Born in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland, Abdul Halim Kazi was the son of Zubaidah Schutt, the daughter of a Swiss industrialist, and Abdul Hamid Kazi, a visiting doctoral student from India.

He moved with his mother to Berlin and spent his youth there during the height of World War II. A curious child, he watched at close range the nightly bombing of the city.

“He was lucky to be alive. He’d go to the roof of his home to see the planes arrive,” said a son, Aaron Kazi.

“My father and his mother went to the market one day and were caught in a bombing raid,” said another son, Ethan Kazi. “They returned to their home to find it was destroyed and the other persons living there had been killed.”

He became a refugee after World War II. He and his mother eventually moved to the Kazi estate in Bihar, India.

“They left Berlin and were soon captured by the Russians. They had no food and the Russians casually shot a cow and strong Russian women traveling with the soldiers cooked it up,” Aaron Kazi said. “My grandmother told them she was a British citizen and did not want to enter the Russian sector.

“The soldiers all got drunk one night on vodka and fell asleep. My grandmother got up and walked on foot to nearby American troops who connected them to the British soldiers.

“My grandmother had a title — she was an Indian princess — and had papers with a coat of arms. She insisted she be treated well. The British recognized her title and put her in a mini-chateau. She was also persistent. The officers took up a collection for boat passage for them to India,” Aaron Kazi said. “The whole time my father carried a small stuffed rabbit.”

Their stay in India was not long. They fled north to the newly created Pakistan during the 1947 Partition of India.

After several years in Pakistan, they moved to a German-speaking community in Cairo. He attended the American University in Cairo and earned a bachelor’s degree in physics in 1954.

He then emigrated to America and attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, where he earned a master’s degree in physics. He went on to get a master’s and doctorate in nuclear engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge.

He met his future wife, Patricia Stewart, at a Valentine’s Day dance in Boston after walking through a snowstorm to get there.

His thesis adviser was Dr. Hans Mark, who went on to become secretary of the Air Force and a deputy NASA administrator.

Mr. Kazi earned multiple patents for his nuclear reactor designs and obtained U.S. citizenship in 1962.

He was a staff scientist at General Atomics, a section chief at the advanced reactors division of United Nuclear and then an Army civilian worker.

In 1968 he took a position at the Aberdeen Proving Ground in Harford County. He was charged with designing and building a new atomic reactor to test military equipment during operational conditions.

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He then worked as a chief investigator at the reactor at Aberdeen until 1987 when he took over as the director of radiation, simulation and analysis.

He received the President’s Award for Distinguished Federal Civilian Service, the highest honor granted to civilian employees, in 2001.

Mr. Kazi enjoyed gardening, tending to his pool, speaking German, drinking dark German beers, and vacationing at the family summer home on Swan’s Island, Maine.

Survivors include his wife of 65 years, Patricia Stewart Kazi, an artist; two sons, Aaron Kazi Sr., of Jarrettsville, and Ethan Kazi, of Forest Hill; and five grandchildren.

Services are private.