Tropical Cyclones (continued)

Young Ray Wilkie had joined the Bureau after serving in the RAAF during the war and, like Bob Southern, after training as a forecaster was to develop special skills in the Tropical Cyclone Warning Centre. It is interesting to recall that Bob Southern was the first Deputy Director in Darwin when a Tropical Cyclone Warning Centre was established in that city early in 1963. Ray Wilkie had succeeded him not many months before Cyclone Tracy destroyed Darwin. I have written a tribute to the magnificent performance of Ray and his staff using radar images to detect and track Tracy's movements for some days before issuing the warning that Tracy was destructive and was headed directly for Darwin (see Gibbs, 1977).

Len Dwyer was quick to realise the importance of demonstrating the Bureau's eagerness to improve its performance and he charged me with the responsibility of organising an internal Bureau conference on tropical cyclones and a tropical cyclone symposium. He also decided that the Brisbane, Perth and Darwin offices should be designated Tropical Cyclone Warning Centres and sought to secure Public Service Board and Treasury approval for increased manpower and instrument resources for the tropical cyclone warning system.

Bureau of Meteorology