By Simon Voisey, 1st VP
Word From the Board - Jan 2023
Simon Voisey is GSH's 1st VP and a staff geophysicist specializing in quantitative interpretation (QI) at Apache Corporation based in Houston with 18 years of industry experience. He holds an MSc in Petroleum Geoscience from the University of Aberdeen and a BSc in Geophysics from UCL (University College London).
He has played active roles in both the SEG and GSH. Simon has served in 2023, 2022, 2021 & 2019 GSH spring symposium planning committees. Simon is on the SEG DISC committee, reviews abstracts, and chaired the 2019 AVOSI technical sessions for the SEG annual conference. 2004 Simon started his geophysical career in London at Scott Pickford. In 2005, he joined Hampson-Russell software and moved to Houston in 2009. 2014 Simon joined Apache Corporation and continues to work in their Applied Geoscience Technology (AGT) group, focusing mainly on Egypt and North Sea assets.
In Simon's free time, he is a keen hiker and has trekked many of America's National Parks. In addition, he is a season ticket holder for the Houston Dynamo soccer team and the Houston SaberCats rugby team.
2023 is here, and I feel extremely optimistic about the year ahead. At the Geophysical Society of Houston the 1st VP is in charge of technical events, and we have an exciting upcoming technical program that builds off a very successful 2022.
Our main 2023 event is the Spring Symposium scheduled for the 19th & 20th of April, honoring Matt Hall. Matt is a great ambassador known for his passion of sharing knowledge. The Spring Symposium will be a celebration of his outstanding Python programming contributions to the geosciences. Matt is currently a scientific programmer working on various open source tools for scientists and engineers at Equinor. Some of his additional achievements include founding Agile, collaborating in softwareunderground.org and hosting numerous hackathons. Therefore, Python programming is the theme of the Spring Symposium in honor of Matt Hall. On the 20th of April, we will be holding a hackathon to promote Python innovation.
We are thrilled with the opportunity of hosting the 2023 Spring Symposium at the Houston Museum of National Sciences (HMNS). Jackie Ming is doing a tremendous job as chair of the Spring Symposium committee, her leadership and dedication to organizing the event and securing the HMNS as the venue for the spring symposium is to be applauded. In addition, this year will include an evening event in the HMNS gem and mineral exhibit.
The 2022/23 hybrid GSH Technical Lunches, held at Apache, have been successful due in part to Lillian Jones, who has excelled in her role as the GSH Technical Lunch chair. Lillian has provided a strong speaker lineup and made the talks more accessible by including online participation. The 2022 program rounded out the year with an outstanding presentation by Manika Prasad (Colorado School of Mines). Lillian is the GSH 1st VP elect, and I have no doubt she will secure and execute a fantastic 2023/24 technical schedule.
Adam Mattson has provided excellent support on the GSH Technical Breakfast online program. Since the program is online, we can source speakers outside Houston, including Australia, the Netherlands and Canada, achieving well-attended and well-received events.
Katie Fry's editorial team has been providing fantastic support to the GSH Technical committees. From Matt Blyth with online flyers for the technical events to Teresa Rubino's continuing improvements to journal.gshtx.org. Teresa's implementation of the technical event submission form is helping to streamline the organization of events.
The GSH is a team effort, as 1st VP I have appreciated all the support from the additional GSH committees and board members including a special recognition for Kathy at the GSH office, who, without her input, the GSH Technical Events would not happen.
Finally, and certainly not least. Thank you to everyone who has attended a GSH Technical Event in 2022. I hope to see you in 2023.