I was extremely pleased to see that Dr Sue Loughlin BGS Head
of Volcanology was
honoured with an MBE in the New Years honours list Sue not only plays a pivotal
role within the BGS Volcanology team but also within the wider volcanology
community where she has long been recognised and respected as one of the
leading scientists in the UK. It's Sue's passion for working with other leaders
in the field, as well as early-career scientists, that has resulted in her
successful leadership of global collaborations including Global Volcano Model and
ground-breaking research such as FutureVolc.
Sue has forged new ground in interdisciplinary science and global level
projects such as STREVA, VANAHEIM,
EVOSS and VOGRIPA and been
key in applying our science in order to protect lives, livelihoods and
communities at risk. A huge congratulations to Sue from us all at BGS!
BGS staff occasionally get an award from the Queen's New
year honours or Her birthday's honours. These tend to reward our public good
science role.
Our mixed role as scientists is quite a juggling act. We
produce science results and scientific interpretations to provide the
government and public with reassurance or with what is needed to make a
decision. In the case of volcanology this advice is related mainly to the
Iceland volcanic system, both during the 2010 activity and also
possibility of future activity. We worked with the Icelandic meteorological office and also with
the UK Met Office, the UK research
National Centre for
Atmospheric Science in monitoring the Iceland ash clouds and Eyjafjallajökull Volcano. Since then we have enhanced our
monitoring systems in Iceland and we are part of a major EU funded supersite
initiative on Iceland.
Other public good activities involve resource estimates
for the UK, groundwater
monitoring, geological
stability of the UK, vulnerability to climate
change and many more. All of the staff involved in this work
deserve a medal, unfortunately we only get one now and again, but I’d like to
take the opportunity to thank the BGS staff for their efforts.
Our staff also get satisfaction from recognition after
writing their data in international science publications and the general
feeling that they are doing something very useful for UK society and economy.
My new year's resolution is to write a blog every month at a
minimum, so if you have any burning issues you’d like me to talk about please get in touch.
