Walter Munk, a world-renowned oceanographer who played a crucial role in allied efforts during World War II, has died at the age of 101.
Munk, who was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1917, and moved to America when he was 14, died from pneumonia at his home near San Diego. He became an American citizen in 1939 and joined the army after war broke out, but was later exempted from service because of the value of his research.
During World War II, Munk developed methods to predict ocean wave patterns, helping American troops develop landing techniques which were used in both the Pacific and Atlantic theaters of war. His improved wave forecasting allowed military meteorologists to correctly predict landing wave heights during the D-Day invasion.
Before Munk’s work, the military had not attempted accurate wave prediction. Munk’s inspiration came when he learned the U.S. was planning an amphibious landing in Africa where waves were routinely high enough to swamp landing vehicles. Munk recruited fellow oceanographer Harald Sverdrup and over several months developed the Sverdrup-Munk wave prediction method. Their method proved successful in predicting wave heights for the Allied landings in Africa.
After his initial success, Munk received permission to start a wave prediction school at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography where he trained around 100 officers who went on to predict wave heights for Allied landings.
Two of his students, Charles Bates and John Crowell, went on to accurately predict wave heights for the successful D-Day landings at Normandy. On June 5, 1944, the day the Allies were originally supposed to land, Eisenhower called off the operation for 24 hours when weather and wave predictions showed the conditions to be more favorable.
Successful wave prediction helped catch the Germans by surprise who thought the weather conditions were too dangerous.
“On June 5, 1944, when the operation was supposed to take place, there were very high winds, and Eisenhower made the decision to wait 24 hours,” Munk explained in a 2014 interview. “However, 24 hours later, the Americans predicted there would be a break in the storm and that conditions would be difficult, but not impossible.”
Eisenhower decided to proceed with the operation. Ironically, Munk learned later that the Nazis’ wave prediction was more accurate. “They thought it would be too dangerous for Allied forces to attempt a landing,” he said. “The Germans’ assumption, and the chance Eisenhower took, helped preserve the element of surprise that the Allies needed for a successful landing on the beach.”
Munk accomplished his success in wave prediction with, as he put it, “no education and no background.” It was not until years after WWII in 1947 that Munk received his Ph.D. in oceanography from the University of California.
He went on to have a successful career at Scripps where he ushered in a golden era of oceanography. His research in oceanography helped in everything from early warning systems for tsunamis to surfers trying to find the best breaking wave.
Munk’s scientific genius earned him the President’s National Medal of Science, the highest lifetime scientific award in the United States. In addition, Munk served on multiple panels for the President’s Science Advisory Committee and was the secretary of the Navy chairman in oceanography until his death on Feb. 8.
