Dr Patrick Lever Willmore FRSE (1921–1994) was a 20th-century British seismologist remembered as inventor of the Willmore seismometer. In authorship he is P. L. Willmore. He was Director of the Institute of Geological Science.

Life

Patrick Willmore was a pupil at Worthing High School for Boys. In 1939, he took up a scholarship to read for a BA in

Natural Sciences Natural science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer review and repeatab ...

at St John's College, Cambridge. From 1946 to 1952 he was a Research Fellow at St John's College, Cambridge specialising in seismic activity. In 1952 he was appointed government Seismologist at the Dominion Observatory in Ottawa in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

. In 1952 he was commissioned to investigate volcanic activity on the island of St Vincent in the Caribbean and concluded that the source of volcanic activity could not be located during or after the event and concluded that sensitive areas required continual monitoring by a seismometer. He returned to Cambridge University in 1961/62 then became Senior Seismologist at the Royal Observatory, Edinburgh. He was Director of the International Seismological Summary (ISS) from 1960-1963. In 1964, he became the first director of the

International Seismological Centre The International Seismological Centre (ISC) is a non-governmental, nonprofit organisation charged with the final collection, definitive analysis and publication of global seismicity. The ISC was formed in 1964 as an international organisation ...

, in Edinburgh, a role he held until 1970. Although elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh he resigned in 1980. Dr Geoffrey Robson studied under him.

Publications

*''Manual of Seismological Observatory Practice'' (1960) *''

Seismology Seismology (; from Ancient Greek σεισμός (''seismós'') meaning "earthquake" and -λογία (''-logía'') meaning "study of") is the scientific study of earthquakes and the propagation of elastic waves through the Earth or through other ...

References

1921 births 1994 deaths Alumni of the University of Cambridge Alumni_of_St_John's_College,_Cambridge British seismologists {{UK-bio-stub