BGS Professor of Geophysics
The Bell Named ’Great George’, the bell in the Wills Tower is, on one hand, the very embodiment of solidity and strength and a cultural object of high status and historical value, but on the other hand is just another synthesis of rock and iron that is worn by sun and wind and will tremble with vibration from natural forces. If you haven’t already been on the weekly Saturday tour, … Read more
Tests in the Tower With the help of James Wookey and Anna Horleston a seismometer has been set up in the Wills Tower so we can record what seismic or urban activity is vibrating and shaking the bell in the 215 feet tall Wills Tower. ‘A Day In The Life Of Great George ’ could be shown, … Read more
The Unsettled Planet is a project funded by the Brigstow Institute, that will bring together a diverse group of researchers from the arts, humanities, and science – addressing the Brigstow theme of ‘living well with uncertainty’. Michael Kendall will be working with Shirley Pegna, whose artistic research and practice is concerned with sound as material, together with Tamsin Badcoe (Department of … Read more
We have been at sea for nearly a month, as the guests of the crew of the RRS Discovery. This group of 23 seafarers operate under the leadership of Captain Antonio Gatti. In general, it has taken me some time to get used to the many nautical terms on the ship, but especially the crew … Read more
This cruise has been a bit unusual in that we transited the equator four times, and, given our proximity to the vernal equinox, we jumped between all four seasons. As exciting as this is from both a geographical and celestial point of view, I hadn’t appreciated the naval significance of ‘crossing the line’. I soon … Read more
Today I interviewed the OBS group from the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, which is part of the University of California San Diego. Scripps has a long history of making OBSs. In the early 1990’s, I was a postdoctoral fellow at IGPP and at that time there … Read more
I have been at sea for over 3 weeks now and have seen very little of anything beyond the ship. As our internet connection is barely working, I am feeling a bit cut off from the outside world. In contrast, I have never been so aware of my immediate surroundings. We are constantly monitoring things … Read more
Sometimes things don’t always go as to plan. We arrived at site I04D at 15:00, quickly establishing communication with the OBMT and the OBS. The OBMT was on its way to the surface with an ETA of 17.50 – all was going well. After surveying in the location of the OBS and sending an acoustic … Read more
France has a rich history of working in the oceans, collecting some of the longest tidal records available, for example. During our voyage, we happened to pass the French research ship the “Pourquoi Pas?” off the west coast of Africa. The Institut de Physique du Globe in Paris (IPGP) runs geophysical observatories that monitor earthquake … Read more
PiLAB is a unique experiment in many ways, one of which is that ocean bottom seismometers and magnetotelluric instruments are co-located. This allows the comparison of two very different physical properties of the plate and underlying mantle – elasticity and the conductivity – which together offer insights into the nature of tectonic plates, how they … Read more