Augusto Gansser

Augusto Gansser-Biaggi was a Swiss geologist born October 28, 1910, in Milan, Italy, who died January 9, 2012, in Massagno, Switzerland, at age 101, who was professor of geology at ETH Zurich from 1958 to 1977 and also worked for Shell and the National Iranian Oil Company. He specialized in Himalayan and petroleum geology, conducted pioneering geological expeditions across East Greenland, the Himalayas, Colombia, Trinidad, and Iran, discovered the Indus Yarlung Tsangpo Suture Zone and interpreted it as the tectonic boundary between the Indian and Eurasian plates, identified ophiolites at the base of Mount Kailash advancing plate tectonics understanding, and while in Iran located a major oil field north of Qom that produced what was then the largest known wildcat oil gusher on August 26, 1956. He received the Patron Medal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1964, the Gustav Steinmann Medal in 1982, the Prix Gaudry of the French Geological Society, the title Baba Himalaya from the University of Peshawar in 1983, and the Wollaston Medal in 1980.