| Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93060] |
Mon, 18 April 2016 09:50  |
Liam E. Gumley
Messages: 378
Registered: January 2000
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Senior Member |
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Dear IDL Colleagues,
It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
Sincerely,
Liam Gumley
SSEC, UW-Madison.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93062 is a reply to message #93060] |
Mon, 18 April 2016 10:45  |
Russell[1]
Messages: 101
Registered: August 2011
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Senior Member |
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That is very sad to hear. Though I did not personally know Paul, I am familiar with is posts to this forum and others.
-Russell
On Monday, April 18, 2016 at 12:50:32 PM UTC-4, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93063 is a reply to message #93060] |
Mon, 18 April 2016 11:55 |
wlandsman
Messages: 743
Registered: June 2000
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Senior Member |
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Liam,
Thanks for posting this.
This is awful news. I also only knew Paul through this newsgroup but his posts had the qualities one wants in a friend -- generous, full of wit and humor, and always cutting to the heart of a problem. He will be greatly missed. --Wayne
On Monday, April 18, 2016 at 12:50:32 PM UTC-4, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93064 is a reply to message #93060] |
Mon, 18 April 2016 21:52 |
Jim Pendleton
Messages: 165
Registered: November 2011
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Senior Member |
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On Monday, April 18, 2016 at 10:50:32 AM UTC-6, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
Liam,
I am sorry for the loss of your friend. Paul was one of the folks at the core of this online community and I always found his contributions to be of patience, collegiality, and good will, in equal measure to their technical merit.
Jim P.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93068 is a reply to message #93060] |
Tue, 19 April 2016 09:04 |
rawahranger
Messages: 14
Registered: March 2016
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Junior Member |
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Just a memory of Paul.
Shortly after my book, Traditional IDL Graphics, came out, I was doing a "book tour" on the East Coast. Paul had offered to set up a lecture for me at the NCWCP in the afternoon. In the morning, I had been dropped off by a friend I was staying with at the Naval Research Lab to do a talk to six people who had apparently been dragged to the talk against their will. After the meeting, I was to rent a car, head over to see Paul and whatever motley crew he could put together for a talk, then drive that night to Hampton, VA for another presentation at the NASA Langley facility in the morning.
When I got to the rental car place I discovered that while I had been hiking on the Pacific Crest Trail that summer (the inspiration for writing the book!) my driver's license had expired. No car for me! Shit! I called Paul with a great deal of frantic desperation in my voice. He couldn't come get me, since he always rode his bike to work. But, there was a Metro line nearby that would drop me off close enough for me to still make the meeting, if barely. I could worry about how to get to Hampton later.
When I got to NCWCP, Paul had already been at work on a "plan" that involved catching a "special Chinese bus" on some street corner in Washington that would get me down to Virginia Beach later that night. Grateful, I walked into the meeting, which was absolutely overflowing the room. I don't know how many people were there, but they were packed into the hall outside, too, and they were EXTREMELY interested in buying my book. Wow! Best organizer I EVER worked with!
Later, we took the Metro downtown together because Paul was worried I would screw up the rendezvous with the Chinese bus, too. We had a short meal with a lot of laughter, as I remember. Then he dropped me off on the corner where I was to meet the bus. He offered to stay with me, but I told him I was pretty sure I could get on a damn bus by myself. We shook hands and he left.
Twenty minutes later, I saw a bus full of Chinese people pull up on the opposite corner. I damn near missed that, too. I still hear Paul laughing when I told him later.
I will miss him a lot. Fond memories.
David
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93071 is a reply to message #93060] |
Wed, 20 April 2016 04:36 |
Haje Korth
Messages: 651
Registered: May 1997
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Senior Member |
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This is indeed very sad news. So sorry for the loss. We will miss him.
On Monday, April 18, 2016 at 12:50:32 PM UTC-4, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93073 is a reply to message #93060] |
Wed, 20 April 2016 07:28 |
Jeremy Bailin
Messages: 618
Registered: April 2008
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Senior Member |
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On Monday, April 18, 2016 at 11:50:32 AM UTC-5, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
To echo the many fond rememberences here, I am very sad to hear this -- although I never met him, I felt like I knew him well through this community and always in a positive way.
-Jeremy.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93074 is a reply to message #93060] |
Wed, 20 April 2016 15:40 |
Michael Galloy
Messages: 1114
Registered: April 2006
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Senior Member |
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On 4/18/16 10:50 AM, liam.gumley@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul
> van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He
> suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC
> yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western
> Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new
> system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA
> in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went
> to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW
> with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and
> discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL.
> Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on
> IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was
> the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail
> escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at
> the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007
> he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and
> Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time
> at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative
> Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative
> properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational
> numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen
> user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he
> was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL
> discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international
> atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by
> many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely, Liam Gumley SSEC, UW-Madison.
>
Though I never met Paul in person, I truly appreciated his presence in
this newsgroup and the IDL community. His knowledge, helpfulness, and
wit will be greatly missed.
Mike
--
Michael Galloy
www.michaelgalloy.com
Modern IDL: A Guide to IDL Programming (http://modernidl.idldev.com)
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93077 is a reply to message #93060] |
Thu, 21 April 2016 11:00 |
penteado
Messages: 866
Registered: February 2018
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Senior Member
Administrator |
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Really sad. Like many others, I never met Paul in person, but I will miss presence in this newsgroup.
Paulo
On Monday, April 18, 2016 at 9:50:32 AM UTC-7, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
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| Re: Farewell to Paul van Delst [message #93081 is a reply to message #93060] |
Fri, 22 April 2016 12:54 |
Dick Jackson
Messages: 347
Registered: August 1998
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Senior Member |
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My heartfelt condolences to all who were close to Paul, and thanks to those who shared their stories. It's heartening to remember that Paul's kindly and cogent answers (and questions!) here will continue to shed light for future wanderers.
Best regards,
-Dick
Dick Jackson
On Monday, 18 April 2016 09:50:32 UTC-7, liam....@ssec.wisc.edu wrote:
> Dear IDL Colleagues,
>
> It is with deep regret that I must tell you of the passing of Paul van Delst, a long time user of IDL and contributor to this forum. He suffered a heart attack while biking with friends in Washington DC yesterday and did not survive.
>
> Paul and I were undergraduates at Curtin University in Western Australia in the late 1980's, and we both started using this new system known as "Interactive Data Language" when we moved to the USA in 1991. He went to the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I went to NASA GSFC. When I moved to Madison in 1994 to start working at UW with Paul, we fell into a habit of getting coffee every morning and discussing the latest programming tasks we had been tackling in IDL. Paul was the first person who told me "You should write a book on IDL". A few years later, with his encouragement, I did so and he was the first reviewer. Paul was a very careful programmer, and no detail escaped his attention.
>
> Paul was a researcher at the Space Science and Engineering Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison from 1994 to 2007, and from 2007 he was a scientist at the NOAA National Center for Weather and Climate Prediction (NCWCP) in College Park, Maryland. During his time at NCWCP he was the lead developer of the Community Radiative Transfer Model, a Fortran software system for computing the radiative properties of the atmosphere, that is used in the operational numerical weather prediction models run by NOAA. He was always a keen user of IDL for visualizing and analyzing results from CRTM, and he was never able resist chiming in on a discussion in the IDL discussion group when an interesting post caught his eye.
>
> Paul had numerous interactions with the US and international atmospheric radiative transfer communities, and he will be missed by many colleagues and friends.
>
> Sincerely,
> Liam Gumley
> SSEC, UW-Madison.
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