Division of Environmental and Life Sciences

News From the Deane
The weekly update from the Dean of Division, Prof Liz Deane

Lessons from the Soloman Islands Tsunami Alert for Australia
Resident tsunami expert Dale Dominey-Howes comments

Opportunities
- The Australia-Israel Scientific Exchange Foundation Postgraduate Fellowship Award

Events
- "Quantum Weirdness" talk by Nobel Laureate Carl Weiman
- Free Seminar on the Reform of Legal and Professional Privilege
- Centre for the Integrative Study of Animal Behaviour Colloquium - Scents and sensibility: Mate choice in swordfish
- ELS Seminar Series

News from the Dean

Dear Colleagues

A lovely sunny day for our end of semester BBQ - we must be doing something right!! Thank you to all the Division staff who once again put in such an effort to make it happen - prepare the salads, cooking the snags and onions and keeping the liquid lubrications flowing. Finally thank you to all for your hard work and contributions this semester.

A couple of opportunities:-

Till next week

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Lessons From the Solomans Tsunami Experience

Dale Dominey-Howes from the Department of Physical Geography comments...

The ATWS consists of two components. First is the physical hardware – the actual detection and monitoring equipment. The hardware falls under the joint responsibility of Geoscience Australia which is required to detect, locate and evaluate potential tsunami generating earthquakes and the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) which is responsible for monitoring deep water tsunami detection buoys and tide gauges in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Second is the information and warning component. Where necessary, the BoM issues alert and/or warning messages to Emergency Management Australia (EMA), the State Emergency Services (SES) and media agencies.

When a tsunami has been detected (as on April 2), the BoM runs simulations to determine the probable wave height along our coasts. This information is used by EMA and the SES to determine whether evacuation orders should be issued to local authorities. On April 2, Geoscience Australia successfully determined the location, size and characteristics of the earthquake and the BoM calculated the probability and magnitude of a tsunami. Within 15 minutes, the BoM issued its first advisory message. At this point, the NSW State Tsunami Disaster Management Plan was activated.

The NSW SES established its emergency control centre and began following its protocol for contacting key organisations such as surf lifesaving clubs and port authorities along the coastline. Simultaneously, news of a potentially dangerous tsunami spread across all media networks and live streaming of the warning began.

Fortunately for Australia, only a small tsunami affected the eastern seaboard, and no losses occurred. In the week that followed this event, the media and members of the public rightly asked probing questions about the effectiveness of the ATWS and whether it had performed adequately or, as many in the media reported, had failed.

Such questions should be asked and federal and state authorities are currently engaged in a process of reflection, analysis and learning. However, it is worth noting the following:
1) the physical infrastructure of the ATWS worked very well. Geoscience Australia was able to quickly locate the earthquake and determine its character;
2) the BoM was able to undertake sufficient simulations of the tsunami and issued an alert message within 15 minutes of the event; and
3) transmission of the alert message to EMA, the State SES and media occurred effectively.

However, whilst evacuation orders were issued at specific points along the NSW coastline, the public and the media were confused about the nature, meaning and intent of the alerts and warnings and for most, it was not clear what was happening.

This has taught us two important lessons. First, the physical warning system is not enough in itself to result in a reduction of vulnerability to tsunami. Just because we have a warning system does not mean the job is done. Second, communities need to be educated about tsunami hazard and risk, what alert and warning messages mean, how to react, where to evacuate and how quickly to respond. Furthermore, the emergency services and the EMA must work urgently to effect community tsunami disaster management planning, identification of safe evacuation zones, testing and evaluation of tsunami warning messages and trialling of these plans with the public.

Since December 2004, the Australian Federal Government, its agencies and the state emergency services have made tremendous efforts towards the development and deployment of an operational ATWS and these efforts are to be congratulated. However, much more work needs to be completed to ensure that the emergency management elements of warning and evacuation are properly developed, communicated to the public and tested. Without the latter, Australia’s coastal people remain vulnerable to tsunami and the $70 million of investment may not be realised.

Dr Dale Dominey-Howes is a senior lecturer in the Department of Physical Geography. He can be contacted via e-mail at dale.dominey-howes@mq.edu.au.

This story was adapted from a story appearing in Macquarie University News May/June 2007.

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ELS Welcomes Professor Xiang Yang Chang

Professor Chang is Deputy Dean of the School of Environmental Science & Engineering, Guangzhou Higher Education Mega Center , Guangzhou University, China.

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Opportunities

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The Australia-Israel Scientific Exchange Foundation Postgraduate Fellowship Award

The Australia-Israel Scientific Exchange Foundation (AISEF) was established in 1997, with the specific vision to nurture ties between the academic institutions of Australia and Israel.

The Australia-Israel Scientific Exchange Foundation serves the academic communities of Australia and Israel, and the enrichment, which the cooperation and collaboration between the two countries bring, can be shared by all.

The Foundation established an award for postgraduate students in Australian and Israeli universities to undertake part of their research for their PhD in matching institutions in Israel and Australia. The award, AU$5,000 for a period of up to six months, has been awarded to nine Australian and Israeli students. The funds for this award have come from private donations.

Applications for 2008 Fellowships close on Friday, 27 July 2007 for both Israeli and Australian students. Application information and forms are available from the website link below.

http://www.swinburne.edu.au/hosting/aisef//index.html

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Events

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Free Talk by Nobel Laureate Carl Wieman

When: Friday 29 June 6:00-7:00 pm

Where: Sir John Clancy Auditorium at UNSW.

What: Quantum weirdness at the lowest temperature in the universe.

Contact: Rachelle Carritt: 9385 7307 or r.carritt@unsw.edu.au .

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Reform of legal and professional privilege

To privilege or not to privilege - and whose is it anyway?
The ALRC reference on Legal Professional Privilege

This Macquarie Forum is co-hosted by Macquarie University’s Management School and Division of Law and will be given by Professor Rosalind Croucher, Commissioner, ALRC.

The three words 'legal', 'profession' and 'privilege' all have the capacity to engender negative feelings ranging from irritation to outrage. Put in the one phrase they have the ring of some peculiar perquisite of lawyers, suggesting to some a special advantage invented for the benefit of those who already enjoy a trading oligopoly in overpaid services of questionable social utility. Others view legal professional privilege in economic terms as conferring an unfair marketing advantage on lawyers where the range of services they provide overlaps with those offered by other professions, such as accountants providing tax advice. Where the privilege is invoked to resist disclosure of information to public regulatory or investigative authorities, then it is not infrequently regarded as little more than a lawyer's device to avoid discovery of their clients evil deeds. To the contrary is the view that the privilege is an essential protection for clients protecting their communications with lawyers and that it is an incident of their human right of access to justice. Some also see the privilege as going to the heart of lawyering. It is the interface between the privilege and statutory information gathering powers that is now under consideration by the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC) in its latest Reference from the Commonwealth Attorney-General.

On 29 November 2006, the ALRC was asked to inquire into the application of legal professional privilege to the investigatory functions and coercive information gathering powers of Commonwealth bodies such as the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and federal Royal Commissions; to consider whether it is desirable to modify or abrogate the privilege in order to achieve a more effective performance of those functions in the public interest; and whether it is desirable to clarify all existing federal provisions that modify or remove the privilege, with a view to harmonisation.

The Commissioner in charge of the Reference, Professor Rosalind Croucher, will provide an outline of the issues, challenges and possibilities of the Reference on privilege.

This is a free event, registration is essential to the details below:

Where and When?
MGSM CBD Campus, Level 6, 51-57 Pitt Street, Sydney.
5:30 PM - 6:30 PM on Tuesday the 26th of June, 2007

For further information, contact:
Alumni Coordinator phone: (02) 9850 9327

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Centre for the Integrative Study of Animal Behaviour Colloquium - Scents and sensibility: Mate choice in swordfish

Given by Dr Bob Wong, School of Biological Sciences, Monash University, Melbourne.

Where and When: Seminar Room, 209 Culloden Road, Macquarie University, 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM, Thursday the 28th of June, 2007

For further information, contact:
Dr John Prenter phone: (02) 9850 9468
email address: john@galliform.bhs.mq.edu.au

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ELS Seminar Series

Departments in ELS host seminars covering a wide range of topics associated with ongoing research projects and other areas of interest. The seminars are delivered by academics, research staff, and students from within the Division, as well as guest speakers from other institutions and industry. Details of times, dates, locations and topics of seminars to be held over the next few weeks are listed here.

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Snippets

Industry liable for their emissions
Governments, industry and even company directors could be held liable for actions that contribute to climate change, according to new Queensland University of Technology (QUT) research.

Nurses learn to STAMP out violence
A study conducted at the University of Western Sydney has developed a violence assessment tool to help nurses and doctors in hospital emergency departments avoid violent attacks.

'Comfort eating' may be evolved
University of New South Wales (UNSW) researchers have shown that 'comfort eating' is not a socially contrived phenomenon - but rather one based in biology.

Eco-friendly Earth recycles its crust
Researchers have proof that the Earth recycles portions of its own crust, driving it deep down into the mantle of the planet and then bringing it back to the surface billions of years later.

Exercise beats depression at home
Australians with clinical depression rate exercise as the most beneficial self-help strategy in dealing with this major health issue that affects one in five people.

A warning from Australia's climate past
Research by University of Queensland climatologists into Australia's past climate has shown just how extreme our weather can be.

Moving closer to malaria cure
A single, oral dose cure for malaria is one step closer as new synthetic drugs have been shown to cure malaria in animals.

Universal behaviour seen in particles
A team of Australian and Chinese scientists have found the first observed evidence for "universality" in particles.

Asthma link to obesity
A new asthma gene provides an unexpected link between asthma and obesity according to a research team at Sydney's Garvan Institute.

Smoking increases risk of dementia
Elderly smokers are at increased risk of dementia and cognitive decline compared with those who have never smoked and those who have given up.

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