EUGENE M. SHOEMAKER (1928-1997)
Eugene ("Gene") Shoemaker, 69, was killed in a two-car accident near
Alice Springs, Australia, on the afternoon of July 18. His wife Carolyn
suffered broken bones, and is hospitalized in stable condition at
Alice Springs Hospital.
A geologist by training, Shoemaker is best known for discovering, with
his wife Carolyn and colleague David Levy, a comet near Jupiter. Comet
Shoemaker-Levy 9 was broken up by tidal forces from Jupiter, and
fragments collided with the planet in July 1994. Together, the
Shoemakers were the leading discoverers of comets this century.
Shoemaker carried out pioneering work on the nature and origin of the
Barringer Meteor Crater, near Winslow Arizona, which helped provide a
foundation for cratering research on the Moon and planets. This work
led to the establishment of a lunar chronology, allowing the dating of
geological features of our sateliie's surface.
Shoemaker took part in the Ranger missions, was principal investigator
for the television experiment on the Surveyor lunar landers (1963-1968),
and led the geology field investigations team for the first Apollo lunar
landings (1965-1970). In 1961, he organized the Branch of Astrogeology
of the U.S. Geological Survey in Flagstaff, and acted as its director
from 1961 to 1966. On his retirement from USGS in 1993, Shoemaker became
a staff member at Lowell Observatory. Most recently, he was active in
the Clementine mission that imaged the Moon, and was science team leader
on the Clementine 2 mission. That mission will examine two or more
near-Earth objects close up. Shoemaker won numerous awards, and in 1980
became a member of the Natioanl Academy of Science.
In 1973, Shoemaker initiated the Palomar Planet-Crossing Asteroid
Survey (revamped as the Palomar Asteroid and Comet Survey in 1983). From
his work on cratering, he had realized that the flux of asteroids and
comets in the inner solar system could make them hazardous objects for
the long-term survival of life on our planet. To establish a census of
these bodies and to model the threat they pose, he and Carolyn devised
novel ways of detecting images of near-Earth asteroids and comets on
photographic films. An early supporter of the idea that an asteroid or
comet impact had doomed much of Earth's life (including the dinosaurs)
65 million years ago, Shoemaker was asked by NASA in 1994 to chair a
working group on surveying near-Earth objects.
Shoemaker was one of the founders of modern planetary science, a
discipline much in the news today as the Pathfinder mission to Mars
sends back its first images and isotopic analyses of rocks in an ancient
flood plain. Said Dr. Edward Bowell, an astronomer at Lowell Observatory
in Flagstaff, Arizona: "Gene practically single-handedly 'invented' our
knowledge of the impacts of comets and asteroids on Earth and in the
solar system in general. He was a renaissance man, having one of the
broadest grasps of any scientist I know, working as a geologist,
training to be an astronaut, dating the surfaces of the Moon and other
satellites, and helping, with his wife Carolyn, discover more
interesting comets and asteroids than any other person. I am stunned to
think of the store of unique knowledge that has perished with him. As a
scientific colleague and friend, his guidance was unerring and will be
irreplaceable."
Edward Bowell, Astronomer
Lowell Observatory
1400 W. Mars Hill Road
Flagstaff AZ 86001
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