Pacific Tsunami Warning
Center to be renamed for
weather official ‘Dick’ Hagemeyer

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By Helen Altonn
haltonn@starbulletin.com

Today is a special day for the National Weather Service, "and I think for Hawaii, Alaska and the Northwest," said John J. Kelly, the retired brigadier general who heads the service.

He was among top National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and weather service officials who were to attend a ceremony today dedicating and renaming the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Ewa Beach in memory of the late Richard "Dick" Hagemeyer.

Hagemeyer, who died Oct. 25 at age 77, was a former director of the National Weather Service Pacific Region and for the past 19 years oversaw weather services throughout the Pacific.

He was the only civilian member of the U.S. military's Pacific Command Meteorological Group, manager of the U.S. Tsunami Program, U.S. representative to the International Coordinating Group for the Tsunami Warning Center and its chairman for several years. He was internationally known for his work with the warning system.

Kelly, former head of the Air Force Weather Service, said in an interview, "Whatever capability we have today in forecasting tsunamis and their impact, I don't think we would have if not for that old curmudgeon who kept pushing people along that 'tsunamis kill people in the Pacific and Northwest -- they are important, pay attention to them.'"

Governors in Pacific and northwest states have signed resolutions in Hagemeyer's memory, and he was recognized in the congressional record, Kelly said.

He said a federal employee who helped push paperwork through the Washington bureaucracy to name the tsunami center for Hagemeyer told him: "'This is my way of paying back Dick for all the good things he did in my career.' And she never worked for him," Kelly added.

Leaders of tsunami laboratories around the world, such as Slava Gusiakov in Russia, said, "The success of our projects was due to his (Hagemeyer's) continuing support."

The Ewa Beach center provides warnings to nearly all countries around the Pacific rim and to most Pacific island states.

Most Pacific nations were represented at two international meetings here this week to plan and coordinate research, disaster management and early warning systems in their countries.

They were hosted by the National Weather Service and sponsored by the World Meteorological Organization and United Nations Economic and social Commission of Asia and the Pacific.

Five years ago, the United States was not part of either organization, Kelly said, pointing out that Hagemeyer "was the force that helped us get involved." He also worked to host the first U.S. meeting by those groups in Hawaii, Kelly said.

"The tragedy is that he's not here in body, but I think he's here in spirit, so in a way the meeting is a testimonial to him."