Blog
Climate Change Attribution
Climate Change Attribution It is not unusual to hear of attempts to ascribe a certain extreme climate event to global warming. Much commentary has occurred in recent weeks on the unusual behaviour of the hurricane that devasted the Bahamas and how that behaviour was...
Vale Jack Davies at age 97 – leader, teacher and mentor
Vale Jack Davies at age 97 - leader, teacher and mentor Beach ridge plain at Seven Mile Beach, Tasmania (Source Dr Tom Oliver) In 2016, Tom Oliver, Colin Woodroffe and I visited Jack at his home in Beecroft (Sydney) to present to him our just published paper in his...
Coastal erosion and accretion beyond the historical timescale in NSW
Coastal erosion and accretion beyond the historical timescale in NSW A paper has recently been published in Geophysical Research Letters on the use of beach morphostratigraphic records to decipher past extreme coast erosion (Timura, T. et al., GRL, 7 May 2019). The...
Rethinking Landscape in Aotearoa
Rethinking Landscape in Aotearoa I recently had the privilege of attending the annual conference of the Environmental Defence Society (EDS) of New Zealand in Auckland (14-15 August 2019). This is the major conference in NZ on environmental policy and management. Each...
Collaborative Science and Coastal Adaptation
Collaborative Science and Coastal Adaptation In July an important paper of international relevance was published in Frontiers and Marine Science titled “Collaborative science to enhance coastal resilience and adaptation”. The lead authors were C. Reid Nichols and Don...
CLIMATE CHANGE AND RELATIVITY – SOME PARALLELS
CLIMATE CHANGE AND RELATIVITY - SOME PARALLELS Albert Einstein 1920 (Source: Pixabay) Science can be incomprehensible to many, yet it requires others to help communicate and apply great works such as those of Albert Einstein. Climate change science is also quite...
DOUGLAS W. JOHNSON 1919 AND BEYOND
DOUGLAS W. JOHNSON 1919 AND BEYOND D W Johnson (Image Source: National Academy of Sciences, Vol 24, 1946) One of my prized possessions are books written by Douglas Wilson Johnson. Who is he? I regard him as one of the fathers of modern geomorphology, especially...
The Sandiford Line
The Sandiford Line (Diagram Source: M.Sandiford, 2007, Earth and Planetary Science Letters 261, 152-163) Meanderings around the Australian coast excite one’s interests in so many weird and wonderful ways. Long ago I was fascinated by the writings of Reg Sprigg on the...
A Curiosity of Cusps
A Curiosity of Cusps It is often said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. For me a trip to the beach is enhanced when I see cusps. These delightful, rhythmic features are often so captivating in their geometric perfection that one cannot help pondering on the...
Federal Election 2019 and Coasts
Federal Election 2019 and Coasts I am not sure how many Australians appreciated promises made about coastal issues during the recent federal election. Perhaps very few. This despite the fact that so much of our national well-being and livelihoods are dependent on...
Mangrove Generations
Mangrove Generations It was a thrill last week to attend a meeting of four generations of folk interested in mangrove science. The gathering took place at University of Wollongong and involved my former PhD student, Professor Neil Saintilan, his former PhD student...
South Australian Coastal Conference 2019
South Australian Coastal Conference 2019 The Call for Presentations is now open! Abstracts are due 14th June 2019. See link below for more information and to submit your abstract. More information By ACS Communications Officer | Monday, May 6, 2019...