12
BAMOS
Mar 2020
Conference highlights
Zillman Medal—
acceptance speech
Introduction prepared by Angela Maharaj, AMOS President
Last year AMOS introduced a newly named award, formerly known as the
AMOS Distinguished Research Award, which acknowledges scientists in
their mature years who have carried out most of their research in Australia
and have made a significant contribution in innovative and transformative
research. This award has been renamed the Zillman Medal, to honour the
distinguished contributions of Dr John Zillman to Australian and international
meteorology and science.
Dr Zillman was the Director of the Bureau of Meteorology from 1978 to 2003
and President of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) from 1995 to
2003 and is now an honorary senior adviser at the Bureau. The 2019 Zillman
Medal is awarded to Professor Neville Nicholls, formerly of the Bureau of
Meteorology and Monash University.
Neville is the world’s foremost expert on the nature, causes, predictability and
impacts of interannual climate variability in Australia. Over the course of five
decades of research, he has transformed our understanding of predictability
of climate variations and extremes, and their impact on droughts, crop yields,
bushfire and tropical cyclone activity, as well as human health impacts. He
has initiated and led the development of high‑quality historical climate
databases for Australia and led national and international assessments of
observed changes in climate. Neville is a national living treasure of Australian
climate research and one of the most illustrious and longest serving members
of AMOS, including President in 2010 and 2011.
Unfortunately Neville was unable to join us at the 2020 Conference but sent
along a speech to be read on his behalf. The speech was very well received
by the audience and many asked if it could be published somewhere for the
AMOS community to read. We provide it here for your reading pleasure.