October
2007
Random Profile: Chris Golubieski
Chris Golubieski . |
Every other month, Staff Notes Monthly spotlights a
staff member
selected from the phone directory with the help of a random
number generator. This month we profile Chris Golubieski,
who holds a joint appointment between ISSE and RAL.
On the job: An electromechanical technician, Chris works
in EOL’s Integrated Surface Flux Facility (ISFF), where
researchers focus on exchanges between the atmosphere and
Earth’s surface.
“Our department studies the boundary layer and surface
fluxes,” Chris explains. “We’ll build a
tower
and hang a whole bunch of instruments off of it so the scientists
can get data.”
During field projects, Chris assembles 110-foot
(34-meter) towers, dons a harness, and starts climbing, setting
up instruments along the way.
“I love it. I’m a heights guy, all about being
up high,” he says. “But it does take a special
person, especially when those towers are swaying.”
Field projects take Chris to lots of interesting places—California,
Arizona, Australia. He recently returned from BUFEX II, a
project along Australia’s “bunny fence” in
the outback. The 435-mile (700-
kilometer) fence creates a long, distinct boundary between
croplands and acres of undisturbed vegetation, creating the
ideal place to study how two very different landscapes affect
weather and climate. “It rains more on the natural
vegetation side, making it a really neat experiment,” Chris
says.
When he’s not in the field, Chris is usually calibrating
instruments in anticipation of future field projects, or
checking instruments from previous ones to confirm that they
performed properly. He also spends a lot of time organizing
and maintaining EOL’s large stores of research equipment.
Chris has degrees in meteorology and geology from Miami University
of Ohio. His plan after graduation was to attend graduate
school at the University of Wyoming, but he stopped in Boulder
along the way and never left the area.
He had heard about NCAR a year before he graduated college. “I
applied to NCAR for six and a half years and I finally got
a job—talk about dedication,” he laughs.
In the interim, he worked as a technician at a geology
research development company in Golden.
He’s always been a very hands-on person who has known
since college that he wanted to be in the position of providing
technical support for scientific field projects.
“This is my dream job,” he says of his position
in EOL. “If someone wants to do a study of the atmosphere,
I’ll haul the gear. My favorite thing is everything—the
labor, the hard work, the fun, the people.”
Off the job: Chris grew up in New Jersey and Ohio. “I
didn’t want to stay in the Midwest,” he says.
So he headed west after college, settling in Nederland for
five years, where he served as a volunteer fire fighter.
He currently calls Wheat Ridge home, living with his wife,
Casey, and their dog and two cats. Casey works at a dot-com
company at the Denver Tech Center, making Wheat Ridge an
ideal location between their respective workplaces.
Not surprisingly for a “heights guy,” Chris likes
to
rock climb in his free time, mostly sport climbing and bouldering.
He also snowboards, camps, and plays the drums. Lately he’s
been spending time remodeling his house.
He and Casey visit family in Ohio, New Jersey, and Arkansas.
Casey joined him in Australia in August after the BUFEX II
field project, where they went diving and bungee jumping,
explored the rain forest, and hung out in Sydney as the city
flooded during severe spring storms.
“We were in a bar when the roof collapsed. There was
water coming out of the lights, and the walls were water,” Chris
says. “It was like nothing I’ve ever seen.”
Looking ahead, Chris is interested in returning to school
at some point to become an engineer. In the meantime, he’s
excited by the prospect of future field projects in interesting
locations.
In this issue...
Ice
in clouds
Surprise
finding in the desert
Tackling
disasters in an energy-restricted Boulder
Jeffco
bears fruit
Short
Takes
Getting
their paws wet
Delphi
Question
Random
profile: Chris Golubieski
Just One Look
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