Water & Atmosphere 20, April 2018

How long would it take to count all the grains of sand in the world? About 5000 seconds – a little over an hour and 20 minutes – if you had a Cray XC50. NIWA has just installed one at the High Performance Computing Facility in Wellington.

Less than a week before the official end of summer on 28 February, temperatures dropped and a cool breeze made a whistle-stop tour of the country.

NIWA scientists like Leigh Tait were saddened by the human impact of the 2016 Kaikoura earthquake, but he also says that it provided a “massive natural history experiment”.

Efforts to create interest in STEM education (science, technology, engineering and maths) have led to a 40 per cent increase in tertiary students taking the subjects this year.

Being prepared to give anything a go and thinking outside the box to get a job done – often in incredibly challenging conditions – is something Bob takes great personal and professional pride in.

The first Wednesday of the month finds Philippa Eberlein and her Friends of the Maitai colleagues collecting samples from the Maitai River in Nelson.