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BAMOS March 2023
President ’ s report
Roger Dargaville
In ( Past President ) Angela ’ s 2021 report , she described 2021 as the first year of the ‘ new normal ’ after the immense challenges of 2020 . 2022 continued to be challenging , with the ongoing fatigue of COVID as well as budget constraints on our university sector biting hard . However , AMOS returned to a program of high-quality faceto-face events in 2022 which we look forward to continuing in 2023 and beyond
Casting our minds back to this time last year , we co-hosted
ICSHMO 2022 with the New Zealand MetSoc ( 8 – 17 February ), which we had hoped would be in person but had to be converted to fully online . Nevertheless , many of our members participated in a successful conference .
Mid-year , AMOS hosted the
Fenner Conference on the Environment on Compound Events ( 28 – 29 July ) in Canberra . The Fenner Conferences are an annual event , supported by a prestigious grant from the Australian Academy of Sciences . Last year ' s event had additional support from CLEX , ANU Institute for Climate , Energy and Disaster Solutions , DCCEEW and Natural Hazards Research Australia . The invitation-only event focussed on compound events and brought together the science and end-user communities . This included government , insurance agencies and the agricultural sector . Congratulations to all involved , in particular Nina Ridder for her vision and leadership .
The regional centres are coming back to life after a couple years of hibernation . We have some new leadership with Kate Bongiovanni and Franciscus Liqui Lung co-chairing the Victoria Regional Centre ( noting the name change from Melbourne Regional Centre , consistent with our other centres ). Mark Doubell leads SA and Emma Howard , QLD . Carly Tozer and Kathy Allen continue for TAS , Jatin Kala for WA , Ian Shepherd for NT and Nina Ridder for NSW . Stephen Crimp is stepping down as the ACT Centre chair , so we are looking for someone to take the lead there .
The VIC Centre ran a well-attended and insightful event in December at Melbourne University on the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report . Pandora Hope ( BoM ) delivered the keynote and a there was also a panel discussion with Janet Rice ( Greens party ), Tiffany Crawford ( Melbourne City Council ) and yours truly . We look forward to events at other regional centres to bring together our community .
The prize committee continue their excellent work selecting AMOS prize winners and have also updated the criteria for the awards . The 2022 award winners are Josué Martinez-Marino ( Uwe Radok ), Ariaan Purich ( Meyers ), Andrew Watkins ( Gibbs ) and Dick Whitaker ( Outreach ). We also welcome three new AMOS Fellows : Sue Barrell , Julie Arblaster and Jorgen Frederiksen were awarded the status of FAMOS ( Fellow of AMOS ). Congratulations to all .
Please begin to think about AMOS members you believe should be nominated for the prestigious awards – Uwe Radok is currently open and closes on 31 May . Nominations for other Awards will open midyear .
The
AMOS Annual Conference was held in late 2022 in Adelaide ; it was our first face-to-face conference since Fremantle in
February of 2020 ( just days before lockdowns began ). It was an absolute joy to see our Society back interacting again , sharing their latest research findings at the sessions and planning for future collaborations and initiatives at the breaks and social events . Many thanks to all those who participated and made this a memorable event . Special thanks to our plenary speakers , workshop and session convenors . Highlights for me included the Welcome to Country ( with a digeridoo lesson ) from Uncle Jack Buckskin , the Indigenous weather knowledge session and the Mariachi band at the ice-breaker drinks . I ’ m sure those who attended also have their own favourite moments . I am very disappointed that a positive COVID test resulted in me missing the conference dinner and closing session — but I am very grateful to our vice-president Marty Singh taking over the official duties at the last second . Many thanks to CLEX , CSIRO , Vaisala , Bureau of Meteorology , NESP , ACCESS-NRI , Uni SQ and the Adelaide Team of Business Events Adelaide , South Australian Tourism , Government of South Australia and the Adelaide Convention Centre for supporting this important event .
Other activities for 2022 included submitting a letter of support for our colleagues at the BoM to the Minister for the Environment , including a call for action regarding the difficult working environment . We also led a bid to host the
WCRP Open Science Conference . The bid ( developed in partnership with the Melbourne Convention Bureau ) was competitive but we weer ultimately unsuccessful . We wish the organisers of the 2023 event in Kigali , Rwanda all the best with running this prestigious event .
As we look to the future , we have some important milestones coming up to celebrate accordingly . 2023 is the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Australian branch of the Royal Meteorological Society , which became AMOS in 1987 . Planning for an event in Melbourne in September is underway and details will be announced shortly . The 2024 conference will be our 30th Annual Conference , and the host city announcement will be made soon . If you are interested in being involved in either of these major events , please get in touch .
As well as our events , AMOS will continue its work across a broad range of areas including finalising our DGR status application , preparing a position statement on forecasting for extremes , as well as support for PhD students in relation to scholarship levels and continued leadership in equity and diversity . In addition to the Regional Centres mentioned earlier , we also have a broad range of
special interest and
expert groups and I strongly encourage AMOS members to get involved in any of the areas that are of interest to them . I wish to thank all the members that donate their time and expertise to AMOS activities — you are the lifeblood of our society . I ’ d like to , in particular , thank Steven Phipps as the outgoing AMOS Secretary for all his hard work .