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Geophysicist - Working conditions

Kaimātai Pūtaiao Whenua

Working Conditions

Geophysicists travel around New Zealand and overseas to carry out fieldwork and to attend conferences. They may work:

in offices
in laboratories
at universities
on drilling platforms
at survey building sites.

They can work in extreme weather conditions, for example when working on mountains, at sea, in deserts or near the North and South Poles.

"You have to try and optimise the conditions by planning your fieldwork in the summer, but if you are going to places like the Antarctic then it's part of the challenge to cope with the conditions."

Gillian Turner - Senior Geophysics Lecturer

Equipment

Equipment geophysicists may use includes:

surveying equipment such as theodolites (which measure horizontal and vertical angles)
specialist instruments such as magnetometers (which measure magnetic fields), electrical resistivity sounding instruments (which measure the flow of electrical current) and gravity meters (which measure gravity fluctuations)
global positioning system (GPS) equipment
rock sampling drills and sediment corers
explosives
laboratory equipment such as rock magnetometers and electron microscopes
safety equipment such as helmets, steel-capped boots and harnesses
heavy vehicles.