Bob Carter has passed away following a sudden heart attack.  

Bob was known to many Australian geoscientists as a former professor and head of the School of Earth Sciences at James Cook University, and in more recent years for his criticism of climate change theories advanced by groups including the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Robert Merlin “Bob” Carter was born in England and emigrated to New Zealand in 1956.  He graduated with a B.Sc. (Hons) in geology from the University of Otago in 1963 and returned to England to complete a Ph.D. in paleontology from the University of Cambridge in 1968.  His doctoral thesis was titled The Functional Morphology of Bivalved Mollusca.

Prof. Carter began his academic career as an assistant lecturer in geology at the University of Otago in 1963 and advanced to senior lecturer after obtaining his Ph.D. in 1968.  He was professor and head of the School of Earth Sciences at James Cook University from 1981 to 1998, an adjunct research professor at the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at James Cook University from 1998 to 2005 and a visiting research professor in geology and geophysics at the University of Adelaide from 2001 to 2005.  During his distinguished career, he published over 100 research papers on taxonomic palaeontology, palaeoecology, New Zealand and Pacific geology, stratigraphic classification, sequence stratigraphy, sedimentology, the Great Barrier Reef, Quaternary geology, and sea-level and climate change.

Prof. Carter served as chair of the Earth Sciences Discipline Panel of the Australian Research Council, director of the Australian Office of the Ocean Drilling Program (ODP), and Co-Chief Scientist on ODP Leg 181 (Southwest Pacific Gateway).

AIG publicly extends deepest sympathies to his family and friends.