Profile

I’ve enjoyed my life as a Geologist in the oil and gas industry.  My family and I have lived in numerous countries, as diverse as Iran, Papua New Guinea and the USA.  Foreign travel has allowed me to meet people and go to some very interesting places like the Sahara Desert and the Andes Mountains.  I’ve now got a huge collection of photographs and artefacts!

When I’m not doing Geology, I enjoy working in my garden, planting trees and flowers, and landscaping it with local stone.  I also have an allotment where I grow fruit and vegetables – they taste so much better than shop-bought!  And I’m the groundsman for the village cemetery and churchyard, so I’m out often in the Spring and Summer months, mowing and keeping things tidy.

As a STEM Ambassador to schools, I give talks and Powerpoint slide presentations with lots of videos on geological processes such as volcanoes, earthquakes and landslides, besides teaching about rocks, minerals and fossils.  I teach about natural haards, how they are caused, what the dangers are and what we can do to reduce the risks to us.  I also emphasise that we need to reduce our use of fossil fuels and instead, turn to green energy such as geothermal, nuclear, wind and solar.

I aslo do a lot of work with adult education groups, giving talks on geoscience topics and taking them on field trips to different parts of the UK.

A typical STEM Ambassador day is: drive to the school, set everything up in the classroom, then give my talk amd slide show for 2 hours.  I’ll then do the same thing with another class in the afternoon before driving home again.

If I’m not doing STEM work, and it’s not raining, I’ll be outside somewhere, digging, planting, landscaping, doing tree work or mowing the cemetery.

If it’s raining, I’m probably at my laptop preparing for my next talk.  Earlier this week, I gave a 2-hour talk on The Geology of Africa.  And now I’ve just started preparing my next talk: “The Geology of Antarctica”.