Edith Farkas (meteorologist)

Edith Elisabeth Farkas (born October 13, 1921 in Gyula , Hungary ; † February 3, 1993 Wellington , New Zealand ) was a Hungarian-New Zealand meteorologist and polar researcher . She spent more than 30 years researching the depletion of the ozone layer and in 1975 she was the first Hungarian and first employee of the New Zealand Meteorological Service to set foot on the Antarctic .

Life

Edit Erzsébet Farkas was born in 1921 as the daughter of the writer and seaman István Kőszegi-Farkas (1895–1976). Farkas graduated from the Péter Pázmány Catholic University in 1944 with a degree in physics and mathematics . At the end of the Second World War , her parents fled to Austria with their two daughters. After spending several years in refugee camps, the family managed to emigrate to New Zealand in 1949. There Farkas worked first as a kitchen helper in a hospital and then in a library. She learned English and was able to complete her master's degree at Victoria University of Wellington in 1952 .

The following year, Farkas was hired as a meteorologist in the research department of the New Zealand Meteorological Service (MetService) . In the 1960s, the study of the ozone layer with the Dobsonian spectrophotometer became a focus of her work. At that time, ozone was still used as a tracer to study the atmospheric circulation . At that time she belonged to a still small group of scientists who were internationally active in this field. At an international meeting on tropical meteorology in Rotorua in 1963, Farkas was one of two female participants in a group of 76 researchers.

In later years measurements of ozone pollution were added. During a ten-day research stay, she undertook ozone measurements at the New Zealand Antarctic station Scott Base in 1975 and examined the turbidity of the atmosphere .

Farkas published about 40 scientific papers and reports.

Edith Farkas died of bone cancer on February 3, 1993 after a long illness . Before she died, she had organized her diaries and archives. Her nephew Andrew Kemeny published the book The Farkas Files in 2014 based on her diaries from the time of the Second World War .

Honor

Farkas was the first woman to receive the Meteorological Services Henry Hill Award in 1986 .

Fonts

• Measurements of atmospheric ozone at Wellington, New Zealand . NZMS, Wellington 1954.
• Variations of total ozone and stratospheric temperatures over high latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere . NZMS, Wellington 1970.
• Total ozone variations in New Zealand, 1951-1972 . NZMS, Wellington 1973.
• Surface ozone variations in the Auckland Region . NZMS, Wellington 1979.

literature

• R. Munster: Edith Elisabeth Farkas 1921–1993 (obituary, English; online ) In: Földrajzi Múzeumi Tanulmányok . Volume 12. Magyar földrajzi gyűjtemény, Érd 1993. p. 110.
• Dénes Balázs: In Memoriam: Farkas Edit Antarktika Kutatója (1921–1993) (obituary, Hungarian; online ) In: Földrajzi Múzeumi Tanulmányok . Volume 12. Magyar földrajzi gyűjtemény, Érd 1993. pp. 109f.

Individual evidence

1. ^ The Farkas Files .