David McNiven Garner (26 November 1928 – 13 May 2016) was notable as a published research

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

, with a focus in

physical oceanography Physical oceanography is the study of physical conditions and physical processes within the ocean, especially the motions and physical properties of ocean waters. Physical oceanography is one of several sub-domains into which oceanography is divi ...

and

ocean circulation An ocean current is a continuous, directed movement of sea water generated by a number of forces acting upon the water, including wind, the Coriolis effect, breaking waves, cabbeling, and temperature and salinity differences. Depth contours, s ...

History

Garner attended

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...

from 1959 to 1962, where he graduated with a

PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...

Physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

on 22 October 1962. Dr. Garner returned to New Zealand in 1962, joining a team of scientists that founded the New Zealand Oceanographic Institute of the

Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, abbreviated DSIR was the name of several British Empire organisations founded after the 1923 Imperial Conference to foster intra-Empire trade and development. * Department of Scientific and Industria ...

(today known as

National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research The National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research or NIWA ( mi, Taihoro Nukurangi), is a Crown Research Institute of New Zealand. Established in 1992, NIWA conducts research across a broad range of disciplines in the environmental scien ...

), then located in Hobson Street,

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...

, New Zealand. Garner immigrated with his family to Canada in 1968, as a physical oceanographer in the

department at the

Bedford Institute of Oceanography The Bedford Institute of Oceanography (BIO) is a major Government of Canada ocean research facility located in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. BIO is the largest ocean research station in Canada. Established in 1962 as Canada's first, and currently la ...

Nova Scotia, Canada Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Engl ...

from February 1968 to July 1971, where his topics of research included effects around the

Mid-Atlantic Ridge The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is a mid-ocean ridge (a divergent or constructive plate boundary) located along the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, and part of the longest mountain range in the world. In the North Atlantic, the ridge separates the North Ame ...

. He worked extensively on the oceanographic

research Research is "creativity, creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular att ...

vessels CSS Dawson and CSS Hudson (Canadian Scientific Ship, painted Survey Ship white, and run by the

), which today is the

CCGS Hudson CCGS ''Hudson'' was an offshore oceanographic and hydrographic survey vessel operated by the Canadian Coast Guard. The ship entered service in 1963 with the Canadian Oceanographic Service, stationed at the Bedford Institute of Oceanography, call ...

. His voyages included a portion of the first ever

circumnavigation Circumnavigation is the complete navigation around an entire island, continent, or astronomical object, astronomical body (e.g. a planet or natural satellite, moon). This article focuses on the circumnavigation of Earth. The first recorded circ ...

of North and South America by the CSS Hudson in 1970, on which he was a watch keeper, not a scientist. Garner returned with his family to New Zealand in 1971, where he was a senior lecturer at the

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

Physics Department from approximately July 1971 to 1974, in

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

, New Zealand. During his tenure, he worked on the physical oceanographic aspects of an ecological impact report by the university for Shell BP Todd Maui in their

offshore drilling Offshore drilling is a mechanical process where a wellbore is drilled below the seabed. It is typically carried out in order to explore for and subsequently extract petroleum that lies in rock formations beneath the seabed. Most commonly, the te ...

operations.

Scientific Publications

* 1952: Seasonal Variation in the

Aurora Australis An aurora (plural: auroras or aurorae), also commonly known as the polar lights, is a natural light display in Earth's sky, predominantly seen in high-latitude regions (around the Arctic and Antarctic). Auroras display dynamic patterns of br ...

, ''NZ J Sci Tech'' * 1953: Physical Characteristics of Inshore surface waters between

Cook Strait Cook Strait ( mi, Te Moana-o-Raukawa) separates the North and South Islands of New Zealand. The strait connects the Tasman Sea on the northwest with the South Pacific Ocean on the southeast. It is wide at its narrowest point,McLintock, A H, ...

and

Banks Peninsula Banks Peninsula is a peninsula of volcanic origin on the east coast of the South Island of New Zealand. It has an area of approximately and encompasses two large harbours and many smaller bays and coves. The South Island's largest cit ...

, New Zealand, ''N.Z. J. Sci. Tech.'' B35: 239–46. * 1957:

Hydrology Hydrology () is the scientific study of the movement, distribution, and management of water on Earth and other planets, including the water cycle, water resources, and environmental watershed sustainability. A practitioner of hydrology is calle ...

Chatham Rise The Chatham Rise is an area of ocean floor to the east of New Zealand, forming part of the Zealandia continent. It stretches for some from near the South Island in the west, to the Chatham Islands in the east. It is New Zealand's most productive ...

, in ''N.Z. Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Bulletin'' 122: 18–27 * 1959: The Sub-tropical Convergence in New Zealand Coastal Waters. ''New Zealand Journal of Geology and Geophysics''. 2: 315–37 * 1959: A section of

Carbon-14 Carbon-14, C-14, or radiocarbon, is a radioactive isotope of carbon with an atomic nucleus containing 6 protons and 8 neutrons. Its presence in organic materials is the basis of the radiocarbon dating method pioneered by Willard Libby and coll ...

activities of sea water between 9 deg south and 66 deg south in the south-west Pacific Ocean. ''New Zealand Journal of Geology and Geophysics'' * 1960:

of New Zealand Coastal Waters 1955. ''N.Z. Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Bulletin'' 138. * 1962: Biological results of the

Chatham Islands The Chatham Islands ( ) (Moriori: ''Rēkohu'', 'Misty Sun'; mi, Wharekauri) are an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean about east of New Zealand's South Island. They are administered as part of New Zealand. The archipelago consists of about te ...

1954 expedition: Part 5 Bergquist, PR; Pike, RB; Hurley, DE; Ralph, PM; Garner, DM ''New Zealand Oceanographic Institute Memoir'' .Z. Oceanogr. Inst. Mem. no. 13, 60 pp. 1961. * 1962: Analysis of hydrological observations in the New Zealand region, 1874–1955. * 1962: The average horizontal wind driven mass transport of the

Atlantic The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe an ...

for February as obtained by

numerical methods Numerical analysis is the study of algorithms that use numerical approximation (as opposed to symbolic manipulations) for the problems of mathematical analysis (as distinguished from discrete mathematics). It is the study of numerical methods th ...

. ''Scientific report under contract Nonr 285(03), New York University, College of Engineering, Research Division.'' * 1962: Some Studies On The Ocean Circulation ''Dissertation in the Department of Meteorology and Oceanography submitted to the faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Science in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at New York University.'' * 1965:

of New Zealand offshore waters. * 1967:

of the

Hikurangi Trench The Hikurangi Trench, also called the Hikurangi Trough, is an oceanic trench in the bed of the Pacific Ocean off the east coast of the North Island of New Zealand, lying between the southern end of the Cook Strait and the Chatham Rise. It is the ...

region. Mere. N.Z. Oceanogr. Inst. 39, Wellington, 177 pp. * 1967:

of the south-east

Tasman Sea The Tasman Sea (Māori: ''Te Tai-o-Rēhua'', ) is a marginal sea of the South Pacific Ocean, situated between Australia and New Zealand. It measures about across and about from north to south. The sea was named after the Dutch explorer Abe ...

. * 1967: The

fauna Fauna is all of the animal life present in a particular region or time. The corresponding term for plants is ''flora'', and for fungi, it is '' funga''. Flora, fauna, funga and other forms of life are collectively referred to as '' biota''. Zoo ...

of the

Ross Sea The Ross Sea is a deep bay of the Southern Ocean in Antarctica, between Victoria Land and Marie Byrd Land and within the Ross Embayment, and is the southernmost sea on Earth. It derives its name from the British explorer James Clark Ross who vi ...

. Part 5. General accounts, station lists, and benthic ecology. Bullivant, JS; Dearborn, JH; Garner, DM ''New Zealand Oceanographic Institute Memoir'' .Z. Oceanogr. Inst. Mem. no. 32, 77 pp. 1967. * 1969: The geopotential topography of the ocean surface around New Zealand. ''N.Z.J. Mar. Freshwater Res.'', 3, 209 219. * 1969: The

near 45 degrees N:(4) Water properties in the median valley. Garner, D.M., Ford, W.L. ''Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences'', 1969, v.6 pp. 1359–1363 * 1969: Vertical surface acceleration in a wind-generated sea. Garner, D.M. ''Deutsche hydrographische zeitschrift'', 1969, v.22 pp. 163–168 * 1970: Hydrological studies in the New Zealand region 1966 and 1967. Oceanic hydrology north-west of New Zealand. Hydrology of the north-east Tasman Sea. 49 p

* 1970: Vertical surface acceleration in a wind-generated sea. ''Ocean Dynamics'' Volume 22, Number 4 / July 1969. See also ''Deutsche hydrographische Zeitschrift 22(4)'': 163–8 * 1972: Flow through the

Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone Charlie-Gibbs Fracture Zone is a system of two parallel fracture zones. It is the most prominent interruption of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between the Azores and Iceland. It can be traced over more than 2000 kilometers, all the way from north-eas ...

. Garner, D.M. ''Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences'', 1972, v. 9, pp. 116–121 * 1973: The meridional distribution of

silicate In chemistry, a silicate is any member of a family of polyatomic anions consisting of silicon and oxygen, usually with the general formula , where . The family includes orthosilicate (), metasilicate (), and pyrosilicate (, ). The name is al ...

in the western Atlantic Ocean. Mann, C.R., Coote, A.R., Garner, D.M. ''Deep-Sea Research and Oceanographic Abstracts'', 1973, v.20, pp. 791–801

Personal

After leaving secondary school in 1946, David could not get into University because of a preference for

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

returned servicemen, so he got a job for a year (1946–47) on the Meteorological Sounding Team Canterbury Project on radar meteorology with the

, based at the

Ashburton Aerodrome Ashburton Aerodrome is a small airport to the east of Ashburton, New Zealand, Ashburton township on the east coast of the South Island, New Zealand. Newmans Air operated a Christchurch to Queenstown service via Ashburton in the 1980s which a ...

. The New Zealand

National Film Unit The National Film Unit (NFU) was a state-owned film-production organisation originally based in Miramar, New Zealand. Founded in 1936 when the government took over a private film studio, Filmcraft, the NFU produced newsreels, documentaries and p ...

made a short film of the activities for its Weekly Review which showed in cinemas as a short subject. The film shows David getting into an

Avro Anson The Avro Anson is a British twin-engined, multi-role aircraft built by the aircraft manufacturer Avro. Large numbers of the type served in a variety of roles for the Royal Air Force (RAF), Fleet Air Arm (FAA), Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) a ...

, and working with a kite on the back of a truck, and a trawler. David attended Stages I and II at

Canterbury College Canterbury College may refer to: * Canterbury College (Indiana), U.S. * Canterbury College (Waterford), Queensland, Australia * Canterbury College (Windsor, Ontario), Canada * Canterbury College, Kent, England * Canterbury College, Oxford, England ...

, then moved to

where he graduated

BSc A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years. The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University of ...

and

MSc MSC may refer to: Computers * Message Sequence Chart * Microelectronics Support Centre of UK Rutherford Appleton Laboratory * MIDI Show Control * MSC Malaysia (formerly known as Multimedia Super Corridor) * USB mass storage device class (USB MSC ...

from the Victoria College of the University of New Zealand. After graduation David was employed doing

sunspot Sunspots are phenomena on the Sun's photosphere that appear as temporary spots that are darker than the surrounding areas. They are regions of reduced surface temperature caused by concentrations of magnetic flux that inhibit convection. Sun ...

research at the

Carter Observatory Space Place at Carter Observatory (or simply Space Place) is an observatory in Wellington, New Zealand, located at the top of the Wellington Botanic Garden. The site was originally home to the Wellington City Observatory (nicknamed "The Tin Sh ...

in Kelburn,

, from where he published his first scientific paper. David Garner was the father of three children by Edna Jean Garner: including Mary Ann Garner, John David Garner and Steven James Garner. His wife was Kirsty Garner. David Garner died 13 May 2016.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Garner, David 1928 births 2016 deaths Academic staff of the University of Auckland Victoria University of Wellington alumni New York University alumni Physical oceanographers 20th-century New Zealand physicists 21st-century New Zealand physicists