Interview with Klaus Wyrtki
215
people actually differentiate. If you give a child a toy, the first action is to take it apart
and scientists do the same. They see a problem and immediately they take the problem
apart, into pieces. Very few scientists integrate, that means put things together.
Would that mean that you must be concerned in several topics? You got some idea on
El Ni˜ no by studying the seiches in the Baltic. It is completely different phenomenon.
The integration in this case was that you had the association that they might be
relevant. This would mean, it will help if you are curious about many things in the
ocean and study many different things for this integration.
Definitely.
There are other activities of which you are probably even more proud of than about
your scientific papers.
The start of ocean monitoring—now everybody is monitoring the ocean, the big
TOGA TAO array, that constantly gives you interesting data, there are satellites—
you don’t believe what fights we had to get funding for ocean monitoring. While we
argued “we need to observe the same thing year after year, because only if we do that
we see changes. We need to know the ocean month after month, if we want to have
weather prediction. We cannot go out once every five years and make an experiment.
You need to monitor,” there was a constant fight about ocean monitoring. I am very
proud about the fact that I was involved in that and was very vigorously participating
in this fight.
Another thing is free data exchange. I don’t know how often I preached when I
was chairman of NORPAX “in meteorology data are instantly available. Whenever a
radiosonde is launched, the next minute the data go on the radio and into the World
Weather Watch.” Oceanographers keep their little black boxes and the data they have
in them for years in their laboratories and don’t want to relinquish them. Data have
to be available, in particular if you want to make forecasts.
Your life up to the Hawaii occupation was very much changing. You always changed.
Why did you remain after that so long in Hawaii?
I had three years Indonesia, three years Australia, three years Scripps. People were
watching, if I have three years Hawaii, too. Hawaii is too nice to leave it. It is the best
place in the world to live, I enjoyed the years thoroughly—certainly I have no desire
to change anymore.
Maybe now it is time to come to the end of your career—Abschied von der Wissenschaft.
22 Sometime ago you retired and we hear that you have really withdrawn
from science.
That is a part of my way of doing it. I am a person who can change rapidly. There
is a time for everything. There is a time to be young; there is a time to work and to
22 Departing from science.
215
people actually differentiate. If you give a child a toy, the first action is to take it apart
and scientists do the same. They see a problem and immediately they take the problem
apart, into pieces. Very few scientists integrate, that means put things together.
Would that mean that you must be concerned in several topics? You got some idea on
El Ni˜ no by studying the seiches in the Baltic. It is completely different phenomenon.
The integration in this case was that you had the association that they might be
relevant. This would mean, it will help if you are curious about many things in the
ocean and study many different things for this integration.
Definitely.
There are other activities of which you are probably even more proud of than about
your scientific papers.
The start of ocean monitoring—now everybody is monitoring the ocean, the big
TOGA TAO array, that constantly gives you interesting data, there are satellites—
you don’t believe what fights we had to get funding for ocean monitoring. While we
argued “we need to observe the same thing year after year, because only if we do that
we see changes. We need to know the ocean month after month, if we want to have
weather prediction. We cannot go out once every five years and make an experiment.
You need to monitor,” there was a constant fight about ocean monitoring. I am very
proud about the fact that I was involved in that and was very vigorously participating
in this fight.
Another thing is free data exchange. I don’t know how often I preached when I
was chairman of NORPAX “in meteorology data are instantly available. Whenever a
radiosonde is launched, the next minute the data go on the radio and into the World
Weather Watch.” Oceanographers keep their little black boxes and the data they have
in them for years in their laboratories and don’t want to relinquish them. Data have
to be available, in particular if you want to make forecasts.
Your life up to the Hawaii occupation was very much changing. You always changed.
Why did you remain after that so long in Hawaii?
I had three years Indonesia, three years Australia, three years Scripps. People were
watching, if I have three years Hawaii, too. Hawaii is too nice to leave it. It is the best
place in the world to live, I enjoyed the years thoroughly—certainly I have no desire
to change anymore.
Maybe now it is time to come to the end of your career—Abschied von der Wissenschaft.
22 Sometime ago you retired and we hear that you have really withdrawn
from science.
That is a part of my way of doing it. I am a person who can change rapidly. There
is a time for everything. There is a time to be young; there is a time to work and to
22 Departing from science.