Remembering Thomas R. Metcalf

Remembering Thomas R. Metcalf

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09/07/07 13:22:30 Date

This page is devoted to the memory of Tom Metcalf. Tom died suddenly Saturday, July 7th, up on Rollins Pass in Gilpin, CO in a back-country skiing accident. Tom was a devoted father, valued friend, and a talented and generous scientist. He leaves a wake of heavy hearts in the many family, friends, and colleagues who knew and miss him.

MEMORIAL INFORMATION

A service to celebrate Tom's life was held Saturday, July 14th at the NCAR Mesa Lab.

The family is requesting that in lieu of flowers, donations in Tom's memory be made to support activities and causes he was passionate about.

Dr. Metcalf's family has decided to establish a travel grant program with the Solar Physics Division in Tom's honor. The fund will help support members' expenses for attending meetings relevant to solar physics. Preference will be given to graduate students or recent Ph.D. recipients. We encourage you to join the Metcalf family and Tom's friends in making a generous contribution to the American Astronomical Society for the fund: Tom Metcalf SPD Travel Fund, c/o American Astronomical Society, 2000 Florida Ave., NW Suite 400, Washington DC 20009-1231, USA.

Donations can also be made to Bicycle Colorado here to reflect Tom's interest in bike commuting. In addition, the family is working with Boulder Open Space to place a bench on a portion of a trail on Tom's behalf.

Please join us in remembering Tom and share your thoughts and stories here.

K. D. Leka

09/07/07 13:22:31 Date

The Solar Physics community has lost one of our friends suddenly and
unexpectedly. Tom Metcalf was killed in a skiing accident on Saturday 07
July 2007. He was a prolific researcher, also often categorized as "one
of the nicest guys in science". Tom was widely respected for his work in
the observation, analysis, and interpretation of solar magnetic fields,
as well as on solar flare energetics and spectral line diagnostics.
A patient mentor, Tom was recently active in a collaboration to establish
a new undergraduate summer research program in Boulder, and advised
post-docs and graduate students through the years. Tom's life bloomed
both personally and professionally upon his recent move to Boulder,
Colorado -- he was routinely teased as a "closet granola-head" by friends
and family, and traded his long-love of sailing for mountain bike riding,
rock climbing, and year-round skiing. He will be sorely missed by many.

Dick Canfield

09/07/07 13:59:15 Date

I am reminded of how I have valued Tom as a friend and colleague throughout his entire career in solar physics. In 1984, I hired him as as a first-year graduate student at the University of California, San Diego, and guided his early research. Just three days ago we were collaborating on 180-degree ambiguity resolution and flux-tube fitting in vector magnetograms. Those of us who remain will do our best to complete our collaboration in his memory.

During the twenty-three years I knew him, Tom and I enjoyed collaborations of many kinds. On the one hand, after he came with me to Hawaii in 1985 to work on his PhD thesis, we shared the ownership of a 18' Prindle catamaran -- part of his long-lived love affair with the sea. On the other hand, we collaborated on a total of 19 publications, including what is his most-cited collaboration, with Alex Pevtsov and me, on the now well-known hemispheric trend of the twist of active region magnetic fields.

A fine human being. A life too short, but a life well lived.

Dick

David Alexander

09/07/07 14:24:44 Date

I first met Tom in the late 1980's at some conference or other but really only teamed up with him on my move to the US, first on the Yohkoh outreach project while at Montana State, then as a friend and colleague at Lockheed Martin. Most of my enjoyment of being at LMSAL was due to my daily discussions with Tom, the occasional foray to a European "football" game involving a Scottish team, and our love-hate relationship with the game of golf.

Tom is the only person I have seen make a hole in one on the golf course. We referred to it as the "bugs bunny hole in one" as it first hit a tree, rolled down the trunk, raced over a shallow bunker, bounced over the lip, slipped down the hill and into the hole. It was amazing! He scored a 14 on his next hole, hitting the water 3 times, a smile on his face the whole way.

I am left with very fond memories of a truly decent and wonderful person.

Jing Li

09/07/07 15:20:47 Date

I got to know Tom in Hawaii when I moved from France in 1994. My first research assignment by Dick Canfield was to study the spatial relationship between the Hard X-ray emission sites and the photospheric vertical current distribution. The former represents the energetic electrons precipitation sites, and the latter represents the non-force-free components in the photosphere.

The project requires programming skills to generate electric current maps from observed vector magnetograms, and the Hard x-ray maps observed by Yohkoh Hard X-ray Teleswcope. At the time, Tom is the only person from whom I could ask for help - he has developed the pixon-based imaging reconstruction method to rebuit the Hard X-ray images. He is one of members who developed Mees software package which generates electric current maps.

I was eager to get into the project, but lacked of knowledge with the data and the reduction process. I'd go to look for Tom several times a day whenever I got into trouble with the programs, noa mtteer how small the problems were. Tom would come to my office and help me to restart the process. Sometimes, I could see that he was really busy. But he never declined my request.

Whenever I think back the time when I just came to Hawaii, I know that I owe a great deal to Tom who helped me to start research in a new environment. I never know what Tom thinks about me bothering him constantly. But I always remember his kindness, and would like to say a big "Thank you" to him.

Last time when I saw Tom, it was at AAS/SPD in Honolulu in May 2007. We had a brief encounter in front of the poster by his postdoc and him. Now, HINODE is producing large amount of magnetic field data everyday. As an expert on solar magnetic field, he would have cotribued enormously on the data interpreation, and models.

He will be truly missed and remembered.

Tod Woods

09/07/07 15:47:02 Date

I've known Tom off and on over a number of years, less so since he moved to Boulder. I was to meet him for a weekend golf trip in Minnesota in just a few short weeks when I heard of the awful accident.

I have always been impressed by Tom's work as a scientist, but I was even more impressed by Tom Metcalf, the man. He was an honest, humble man who was well-liked by seemingly everyone.
Tom was an excellent father with a tireless devotion to his children.

To his family, I express my deepest sympathy at your loss. Take comfort in knowing that Tom, besides being a terrific father, was a man who was both respected and well-liked by those who knew him. I'll miss you Tom. God Bless.

K. S. Balasubramaniam

09/07/07 16:12:03 Date

KD,

I am saddened to hear of Tom passing away. This is too sudden and shocking. It brings to my vivid memory our recent meeting at the AAS/SPD meeting dinner at Honolulu, May 2007.

Tom has always been polite and helpful, in many ways. His codes for calculation of the magnetic field have always been available to anyone who wished to use it. He has been generous in his insightful discussions on several aspects of solar activity to many of us.
Tom was always a pleasure to talk to, and easy t o follow. He was warm and friendly.

Oh boy! this is an immense loss, and will not be easy to reconcile with.

Please convey my heartfelt condolences to his family and friends. This must be more than hard on everyone. My thoughts are with you all during these difficult times.

Best wishes,

Sincerely,

Bala

Joe Werne

09/07/07 16:27:44 Date

i have known tom only briefly since he joined nwra. he always gave me the impression of a happy, kind, and gentle spirit. i enjoyed the time i spent with him, and i am sorry the opportunity to personally know him better is now gone.

one of my first interactions with tom involved advice i sought on bike lights. he was ready with a wealth of research and opinion. i chuckle at the image of the two of us cramped in the shower room at cora with the lights off and the door closed, testing bulb illumination patterns on the far wall.

recently i talked with tom at the aas meeting in honolulu. tom was happy and relaxed, and he gave me excellent advice on things i should see when vacationing later on the big island and maui. one of my last memories of tom is the twinkle in his eye when he pointed out that one need not get up early to race to the top of haleakala to see the sunrise. between you and me, he said, the sunset is often just as glorious, and you don't need to start at 4am to see it.

my heart goes out to all those close to tom left behind.

Lyndsay Fletcher

09/07/07 17:02:32 Date

I first met Tom almost ten years ago when we were both briefly at Goddard learning about SOHO, but then got to know him as a colleague and friend during my 2 years at Lockheed Martin. We kept in contact since then, emailing about RHESSI and white-light flares. We last met in Boulder in autumn 2006, talked about new white-light projects, chewed the fat a bit, and had a chuckle about how grand his new office was. I think that he was really happy in Boulder.

Tom was always cheerful, patient and considerate, and a wry comment was the closest he ever came to complaining. He was brilliant in all kinds of scientific and technical endeavours, more than happy to share freely the fruits of his labour and then to guide the idiot through them. But what I remember most clearly about Tom is how he just glowed with pride and love whenever he spoke about his three daughters, and my thoughts are with all his family but with his daughters especially. I can't believe Tom is gone and I will miss him. He was just a lovely person.

Lyndsay

Marc DeRosa

09/07/07 19:05:39 Date

I got to know Tom when I joined the staff at LMSAL in 2001. As someone who didn't know much about the solar corona at that time, he proved to be an incredible resource and wealth of information, in addition to being one of the nicest guys in science (as KD mentioned already).

The memory that comes to mind is also my last meeting with him in Paris a few weeks ago. On our last night in the city, we decided to eat dinner at a small creole restaurant in which none of the wait staff spoke any English. Tom's sense of adventure was embodied by his willingness to pick items seemingly at random off the menu for us (all of which turned out to be really tasty), based on his recollection of the French language from a tour of France after his graduation from college more than 20 years ago.

As an integral member of our coronal magnetic field extrapolation working group, his expertise, humor, and spirit will be sorely missed.