Obituary: Mineral Exploration Inventor Tony Barringer Dies At 83

Few individuals can rival the impact Tony Barringer made on mineral exploration technology, in the illustrious 50 years he spent pursuing scientific discovery and invention in the industry.

A. R. (Tony) Barringer passed away on Aug. 15, in Golden, Colo. He was 83.

He will be remembered for his innovation regarding the measurement of physical aspects of the Earth that few had conceived of before.

Born in England in 1925, he received B. Sc. and PhD degrees in economic geology (1954) at the Royal School of Mines, Imperial College, London. Barringer’s education was interrupted, however, by the Second World War, and he became an officer and served in the Middle East. For his formal education, he chose geology, which he attributed to the early influences of a neighbour who was an avid amateur geologist and his father, who had worked as a mining engineer in Canada.

Upon receiving his doctoral degree, Barringer joined Selco Exploration, the Canadian branch of the British company Selection Trust. After four years as an exploration geologist with Selco, Barringer approached the chairman of Selection Trust, with the idea for a new airborne electromagnetic system called the Induced Pulse Transient electromagnetic system (INPUT).

INPUT was Barringer’s best known and most commercially successful legacy, with the discoveries of more than 25 orebodies collectively worth over $100 billion attributed to it. The majority of modern- day airborne systems owe all or part of their inheritance to the design of the INPUT system.

Barringer Research Ltd. was created in 1961 by Selco and Barringer to allow Barringer to independently pursue the development of his ideas. Over the next 30 years, a steady stream of ideas and technologies emerged from the Barringer organization. In the field of geochemical measurement, the AIRTRACE and SURTRACE systems were two of his major achievements. Barringer developed the E-Phase and Radio-Phase airborne EM instruments used for shallow mapping. This work appeared to shape his later thinking about how natural EM fields could be used for mapping deep structures remotely, a topic that was the focus of his energies in the later years of his life. Barringer presented more than 80 technical papers and was awarded more than 70 patents.

In addition to his expertise in developing technologies, Barringer was also known for fostering a robust league of industry leaders (or as they are affectionately known in the industry, alumni of “Barringer University”) through his research facility.

Barringer’s contributions and knowledge were well recognized by others. He was a visiting scientist to NASA and a visiting professor at his alma mater in London. Various geoscience and industry groups bestowed their highest honours on Barringer; this included the Geological Association of Canada’s Logan Medal (1977), Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ Virgil Kauffman Gold Medal (1980), American Institute of Mining and Petroleum Engineers’ Daniel C. Jackling Award (1985) and induction into the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame (1998).

Barringer officially retired in 1989 but remained professionally active until the last few months of his life. In late 2004, he began his “current project” using natural EM fields to find oil and gas deposits from an airborne platform; he remained engaged in this project until his death.

Barringer is survived by his wife of 60 years, Jean, their five children and four grandchildren. The family has requested that anyone wishing to make donations in Barringer’s honour do so through the KEGS Foundation ( www.kegs-foundation.org)Pioneer Fund.

— Written with files from Laurie Reed, (lereed@aztec-net.com),Ken Witherly and Peter Bradshaw, with ideas and remembrances by many “Barringer alumni.”