Clough Medal 2017-2018

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EGS President Bob Gatliff (right) presents the Clough Medal to Bob Holdsworth.

The Society were delighted to present Prof Robert Holdsworth with the Clough Medal before his lecture to the Society on Wednesday 21 February. This is the Society’s premier award, presented annually to a geologist whose original work has materially increased the knowledge of the geology of Scotland and/or the north of England, or who is Scottish by birth or by adoption and residence and has significantly advanced the knowledge of any aspect of geology. Bob Holdsworth has been awarded the Clough Medal for 2017-2018 in recognition of his exceptional contribution to research in structural geology and, in particular, in establishing the tectonic framework of the Moine rocks of Sutherland, together with many other notable achievements.

Fieldwork Grants – latest report

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The Society supports geological fieldwork at home or abroad with grants from the Clough and Mykura Funds. We are always pleased to hear back about how the fieldwork went, and were delighted to receive a thorough and fascinating account from Bob Gooday about his visit to Alaska in 2017. Bob took part in the International Volcanological Summer School in Katmai National Park, Alaska. This involved staying in the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes for ten days, looking at volcanic features in the Valley and the surrounding Katmai Cluster of volcanoes. The Katmai-Novarupta eruption in 1912 was the largest on Earth in the twentieth century, and completely filled a nearby valley with pyroclastic deposits. These deposits sustained intense fumarolic activity for several years, giving the valley its name. Bob notes that observation of the caldera formed during the Katmai eruption, and discussion of the processes at work have helped with his PhD work on a similar-sized, but much older, caldera system on Arran, western Scotland. So that’s at least one thing that Alaska and Arran have in common …

A mother brown bear with her cub on the shore of Naknek Lake at Brooks Lodge. Bob Gooday.