Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 1

Greetings from the Chair It is a real thrill for me to welcome all of

you to the first edition of the Dalhousie

Earth Sciences newsletter in several

years. Our department is entering an

exciting period of renewal, which will

include a concerted effort to rebuild our

capacity in marine geoscience while

maintaining our commitment to our flag-

ship BSc Honours and PGeo pro-

grammes in Geology and Environmental

Geoscience.

As part of our renewal process we are

now advertising two new positions - a

Chair of Department to start in 2015,

and a tenure-track Assistant Professor

in Geophysics, Sedimentology, or Geo-

chemistry to start in 2016. Unfortunately

this opportunity has come our way only

because we are losing several senior

faculty members to retirement. Dave

Scott retired in 2014, Martin Gibling and

Milton Graves will retire in 2015, and

Nick Culshaw, and I will probably retire

sometime between 2015 and 2017.

Since 2010, we have added Shannon

Sterling (Hydrology) and Richard Cox,

an instructor in Mineralogy, Geochemis-

try, and Petrology. Mike Young’s posi-

tion as first-year and field school instruc-

tor was recently made permanent.

Check out the mugshots on the follow-

ing pages to see how the “face” of the

department has changed - literally -

since your last visit!

Our undergraduate enrolment is very

healthy right now, with about 90 stu-

dents in years 2 to 4, the highest it has

been for many years. This poses some

challenges, as our labs and classrooms

are stretched to capacity, but the energy

and enthusiasm our students bring to

the department is invigorating for every-

one. Our graduate students and faculty

are engaged in research that spans

Canada from the High Arctic to the

Great Lakes and Atlantic Ocean, and

across the world in places as diverse as

the Himalayas, the Alps, Portugal, Nor-

way, China, and South Africa.

A major change in our undergraduate

programme has been the revamping of

our field schools. ERTH 2000

(Introductory), taught by Mike Young

with contributions from many other fac-

ulty members, is now run mainly as a

series of day trips from Dalhousie.

ERTH 3000 (Intermediate), taught by

Isabelle Coutand and Charlie Walls,

continues to operate from Camp Ged-

die, and has been restructured to focus

on basic mapping skills. ERTH 4002

(Advanced), introduced in 2013, is a 4-

week field school based in western Ne-

vada and eastern California, taught by

John Gosse and Mike Young. Grant

Wach continues to offer his popular Pe-

troleum Geoscience field school in Trini-

dad during study break.

Finally, I’d like to thank our energetic

Outreach Committee, headed by Dr.

Shannon Sterling, for their excellent

work in putting this newsletter together.

We hope that it will become a regular

part of our efforts to keep in touch with

our alumni and friends across Canada

and beyond. Please take a moment to

send us your updates via the link on the

last page - we’d love to hear from you!

Chair, Earth

Sciences

For Friends & Alumni of the Dalhousie Department of Earth Sciences December 2014

In This Issue

Department, Undergradu-ate and Alumni News

Who’s who

2014 Field Schools

EARTH SCIENCES NEWS

David Scott, left, and Franco Medioli, right (photos courtesy of GSA)

Happy birthday to Dr. Basil Cooke who turned 99 on October 18, 2014.

BASIL COOKE

Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 2

Dr. Clint Milligan, 95, who 70 years ago was fighting on our behalf in Italy, is in the Halifax Veteran’s hospital (3rd floor) now recovering from a fall. Happy to receive visitors.

Department News

New Book

Congratulations to David Scott

(Professor Emeritus) and Jennifer

Frail-Gauthier (Earth Sciences

PhD student) on their new book

Coastal Wetlands of the World.

“This is a major new contribution

to the study of salt marshes and

mangrove forests” Professor Cur-

tis Richardson, Director, Duke

University Wetland Center

Franco Medioli and David Scott receive Cushman Award On October 29 2013 Dr. David Scott (Dalhousie Earth Science

Emeritus Professor) and Dr. Franco Medioli (former Dalhousie

Earth Science Emeritus Professor) received the Joseph A. Cush-

man Award for Excellence in Foraminiferal Research at the Annu-

al Geological Society of America Meeting in Denver Colorado.

This prestigious lifetime achievement award recognizes their sig-

nificant contributions to the ecology of coastal benthic foramifera.

Drs. Scott and Medioli’s scientific legacy includes their landmark

1978 paper in Nature that established foraminerifera as a method

for the recreation of detailed paleo-sea-levels. In Memoriam Franco Medioli Longtime Earth Sciences Professor Dr.

Franco Medioli passed away peacefully

on January 31, 2014, at the age of 78.

He is fondly remembered by former

colleagues and students for his end-

less good humour and larger-than life

presence in the department. Dr. Medio-

li was born in Parma, Italy. After com-

pleting his Doctorate in Geology in

Parma, Italy, he joined the Department

of Earth Sciences at Dalhousie Univer-

sity In 1969 where he remained until

his retirement in 1996. Franco has al-

most 90 peer-reviewed papers and

book chapters.

Undergraduate NSERC Awards

Congratulations to fourth year Earth Sciences students Jen-nifer Archibald (above) and Jillian Kendrick (below) re-ceived the prestigious NSERC Undergraduate Awards to con-duct research. This summer, Jennifer mapped toxic alumini-um levels in Nova Scotia riv-ers, working with Dr. Sterling. Jillian studied Precambrian bedrock exposures in Geor-gian Bay, working with Dr. Jamieson.

CO-OP at the North Pole This summer, third year Earth Sciences student Kai Boggild spent his Co-op term sailing to the North Pole. Kai was select-ed by Dr. David Mosher, chief scientist of the 2014 Arctic Sur-vey Expedition, to help map the marine geology in the Labrador Sea. They sailed aboard the 120-metre Canadian Coast Guard Heavy Arctic Icebreaker Louis S. St-Laurent for a six-week journey to the North Pole. Arctic exploration is a family tradition Kai; his work this sum-mer follows in the footsteps of his father and grandfather be-fore him both who worked on artic surveys for the Geological Survey of Canada and the RCMP, respectively. Read more: http://tinyurl.com/kgqym89

Undergraduate News

Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 3

Kai Boggild poses at the North Pole (J. Evangelatos photo).

Kai reviews seismic data collected aboard the Louis S. St-Laurent. (Photo: D Reimer)

Field Safety

a 30th anniversary This month marks the 30th anniversary of the tragic loss of our recent Honours graduates Ian MacEachern, 24, and Mark Peter Ponsford, 23. On Dec.12, 1984 both graduates lost their lives when a trench in which they were working col-lapsed on them. The MacEachern-Ponsford Memorial Award commemorates the two young men and is awarded to a student who has ex-celled at field school as well as demonstrated attention to field safety.

Ian MacEachern

Mark Ponsford

2014 Departmental Awards: Congratulations! MacEachern-Ponsford Memorial Award: Sean Kelley

Michael Keen Memorial Award: Erin Anderson and Samantha Hamilton

Douglas Award: Maya Soukup

James L Hall Scholarship: Patrick Manion

Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 4

Who’s Who of Dalhousie Earth Sciences

Faculty Awards

Congratulations to:

Anne Marie Ryan: Dalhousie Educational Leadership Award 2014

Grant Wach: AAPG Prof of the year award 2012

Norma Keeping: Dal-housie FGS Distin-guished Service Award

Richard Cox: Earth Sciences Prof of the year 2013/14

Samantha Van De Kerckhove: Earth Sciences TA of the year 2013/14

Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 5

John Newton is the new com-mander of the East Coast Navy

On July 14, 2013, John Newton (Dalhousie Earth Sciences BSc 1981) became Rear-Admiral of Maritime Forces Atlantic and the Joint Task Force Atlantic. In this role, he leads more than 20,000 personnel and a fleet of 18 ships and submarines. After graduating from Earth Sciences at Dalhousie, Rear-Admiral Newton joined the Canadian Armed forces in 1983 where he developed a special-ty in Canadian Maritime sovereignty. He has deployed NATO missions of the Cold War and the Gulf War in 1991.

Kathy Sullivan takes helm of NOAA Congratulations to Dr. Kathy Sullivan (PhD Earth Sciences Dal-housie) who, on March 6 2014, was confirmed by US Senate to be Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and NOAA Administrator. In this role, Dr. Sullivan leads North America’s top agency for climate, oceans, and the atmosphere. After graduating from Dalhousie in 1978, Dr. Sullivan was select-ed to join the NASA astronaut corps, for which she flew on three

shuttle missions, includ-ing the 1984 launch of the Hubble telescope. 2014 marks 30-year an-niversary of another landmark achievement—when she became the first US woman to walk in space.

Image source: NOAA

Dr. David Simpson receives Honorary Doctorate

Congratulations to Dr. David Simpson (BSc 1966, MSc 1968 from Dalhousie) who received an Honorary Degree from Dalhousie University on May 21, 2014. This degree recognizes his ex-traordinary achievements in scientific leadership and service to society, in particular through his role as President of the Incorporated Research Institu-tions for Seismology (IRIS) from 1991-present.

Image source: NASA

Alumni News

Rear Admiral John Newton addresses the crowd after taking over command of Maritime Forces Atlantic at a ceremony in Halifax July 2013. (ANDREW VAUGHAN / The Canadian Press)

Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 6

Students study folded Horton Group rocks at Rainy Cove, NS

Field Schools and Experiential Learning

Introductory and Intermediate Field Schools (ERTH 2000 and 3000) These two field schools are held for 11 days prior to the beginning of Fall term each year. The 2nd year field school introduces students to the geology of southern Nova Scotia through day trips based at Dalhousie.

The 3rd year students stay at Camp Geddie to map the Moydart to Knoydart beach and the James River woods section.

Graduate Student Field Trip

Each year the graduate students organize a self-lead field trip. In September, seven students made their way through Iceland and Scot-land including the famous Hutton’s Unconformity.

Students graduating from our department now receive over 80 days of field instruc-tion during a typical 4-yr degree

ERTH 2000 students at Five Islands Prov. Park

Earth Sciences re-ceives Shell Donation

The Shell Experiential Learning Fund (SELF), initiated in 2005, was designed to support experiential learning opportu-nities for students in a variety of disci-plines.

Earth Sciences will benefit for another 3 years from a generous donation by Shell Canada. The SELF funding supported a number of experiential learning opportu-nities for our graduate and undergradu-ate students, including our senior field schools in California and Trinidad, stu-dent research projects across the entire spectrum of Earth Sciences, the Shell Fall Field Seminar, and teaching equip-ment purchases. We now have a new set of Brunton and Suunto compasses, a new set GPS units, additional hard hats and safety vests, and camp equipment for the new Advanced Field School. The 2015-17 agreement includes a special category to support diversity in geosci-ences.

Staff and students from Earth Sciences with representatives from Shell. Back Row (L to R): Kyle Landry (ES), Dawn Tobey (ES), Martin Gibling (ES), Grant Wach (ES). Front Row (L to R): Stephanie Sterling (Shell), Fiona Gal-lagher (Shell), Rebecca Jamieson (ES).

Dalhousie Earth Sciences Newsletter earthsciences.dal.ca 7

The intensive Petroleum Geosci-ence Field Methods combines classroom study with a one week field seminar in Trinidad during Spring Break each year.

“The Trinidad trip demonstrated the entire process of hydrocar-bon generation and production within the petroleum systems and the deposition of the sedi-ments involved in the processes” -Carlos Wong, BSc, 2013

Petroleum Field Methods in Trinidad (ERTH 4157)

Read more here (http://tinyurl.com/lffq3mx)

Senior Field Schools

New in 2013, the month-long Advanced Field School (ERTH 4002) mixes remote wilderness camping and rigorous geological training in the desert of southern Nevada and eastern California.

“It was the ultimate classroom. We learned skills we will carry through our careers in geology. After experi-encing this field school, you can't help but grin and feel a certain sense of pride knowing what you have learned, accomplished, and the places you have seen” - Paige Montgomery, BSc, 2015

ERTH 4002: Advanced Field School

Watch our Video

http://tinyurl.com/k6gf535

Stay in Touch

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Department of Earth Sciences

Dalhousie University

1355 Oxford Street, Rm 3006

Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 4R2

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