James (Jim) A. Weinman, beloved father, husband, physicist, and mentor, passed away peacefully on Friday, August 3rd at his home in Seattle. Jim was born on March 10, 1930 in Chicago, the only child of Rose (née Eiseman) and Louis Weinman, both Jewish immigrants from Germany. As a boy, he liked to clandestinely hop on the “schtreetcar” with his friends, play in vacant lots and explore the bustling Windy City.
With a thirst for learning, sharp scientific and mathematical mind, Jim started university when he was only 16. He earned a B.S. and M.S. from Illinois Tech and a PhD in Physics from University of Wisconsin-Madison. After working for the Carnegie Institution of Washington-Department of Terrestrial Magnetism and the Argonne National Laboratory, Jim joined the Meteorology Department at his alma mater in Madison where he was also a volunteer firefighter.
In 1989, Jim became a Senior Scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Centre where he was heavily involved with the joint U.S.-Japan Tropical Rain Measuring Mission (TRMM). While at NASA, he continued to develop rain and snow retrieval algorithms to apply to space-borne microwave radiometers.
Across his long and distinguished career as a physicist, Jim worked at the Antarctic research station, in the Amazon rainforest, Indonesia, Japan, and Australia. Indeed, he managed to visit every continent where he collaborated with other scientists and made many lifelong friends. A dedicated teacher and professional mentor, Jim inspired and encouraged many students onto successful careers in the atmospheric sciences.
Jim also loved to scuba dive, sail, bicycle and play squash. He had a wonderful sense of humour and was well-known as a prankster. In recent years, Jim served as a mentor to graduate students at the University of Washington Atmospheric Sciences Department. He also volunteered as a docent at the Seattle Museum of Flight and spent lots of time explaining the fascinating physics of baseball, paper airplanes, and weather forecasting to his grandchildren.
Jim is survived by his wife, Margaret King, and step-daughters, Siobhan (Larry) and Claire (Adrian), as well as by his first wife, Antonia, and their children, Louise Simpson (Evan) and Roger Weinman. “Opa” Jim will be much missed by his three grandchildren, Theron, Lydia and Sasha, as well as by his friends, colleagues and graduate students worldwide.
Donations in Jim’s memory may be made to the Seattle Cancer Care Alliance (http://www.seattlecca.org/) which unites clinicians and researchers from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, University of Washington-School of Medicine and Seattle Children’s Hospital.
Messages
Seattle,WA
Not mentioned in Jim’s obituary is his important work on lightning research. Since 2002 Jim was the local host for the WWLLN (see wwlln.net) lightning network station in Seattle, using his office for the WWLLN computer, and the antenna on the roof just above. Jim was very involved with our research on lightning, and our plans for using the global lightning data to fill in time and space gaps in the satellite radiometer coverage. Up until the last he was a frequent visitor to the space science lab at the University of Washington, with many new ideas. He was working with us on a paper right up until he died.
Jim will be greatly missed by all faculty and grads in our group.
Sincerely,
Bob
Auckland, New Zealand
Amongst Jim’s many creative ideas that have made a lasting mark in Atmospheric Physics, I also draw attention to his pioneering ideas on three-dimensional radiative transfer and his invention of the delta-Eddington approximation. These had a profound steering influence on this field, especially helping our understanding of the interaction of clouds with radiation at visible, infrared, and microwave wavelengths. While this was serious science, Jim always seemed to approach such problems with a cheerful irreverence, especially when the new results overthrew the older way of thinking. His cheerful irreverence was a characteristic he maintained strongly till the end. It will indeed be missed. He was a great guy, and wonderful mentor.
Sincerely,
Roger
Redmond
All of us at the Explorers Club will miss Jim. He was a supporter of exploring and club activities and always fun to be around.
Seattle, Washington
Margaret and families,
Be it known, Jim was one of my favorites at the Explorers Club in Seattle. He always had keen interest and focus on life and his work and he was always the most delightful of human. When I took leave from the Explorers Club for two years, it was Jim that i missed.
He will not be forgotten, and I dedicate my work on the film Chasing Ice to his memory.
Bryan, Texas
I met Jim Weinman when we both checked in to Goddard Space Flight Center in August of 1978. He was my branch head for a time. We were both UWisc Physics PhDs, though Jim was probably a decade ahead of me. Jim played a crucial role in the development and success of the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission. He was brilliant, creative, productive and hard working. I valued him as a friend and colleague.