Fred L. Wefer was born in Gary, Indiana, U.S.A. on 03 October 1943. He was raised in southern Illinois, attended the University of Illinois, the University of Miami, Wesleyan University, and the Pennsylvania State University where he received a Ph.D. in Astronomy in 1973. He has lived and/or worked in Illinois, Florida, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Maryland, and Virginia. He is currently employed as a Systems Engineer at MITRE Corporation in McLean, VA.
Fred began caving in 1966 with the Nittany Grotto in central Pennsylvania, and has caved extensively in the U.S., Mexico, Europe, Africa, and the Caribbean. He was a member of the team that set the international cave depth record at 1330 meters in the Pierre St. Martin cave system in the French Pyrenees in 1975. He was a member of the team that surveyed the Abyss of Provatina, explored caves and pits on the Astraka Plateau, and opened up the Tymphe Range for detailed exploration, in Greece in 1977. He was a member of the 1986 Dominican Republic Speleological Expedition, and was the co-leader of four successive expeditions to that Caribbean island. He was a member of the Iceland 1993 Kalmanshellir Expedition which surveyed the longest lava tube on that Atlantic island. He was a member of the Barbados 1994 Harrison's Cave Expedition which performed scientific research in this Caribbean show cave. Fred has recently been selected to head the visualization team of the 1997 Wakulla Project, an expedition to a deep submerged cave system in northern Florida.
Fred has been active for more than two decades in surveying the caves of Burnsville Cove, VA. He does research in cave meteorology, cave survey techniques, and the computerized display of three-dimensional cave maps. He is former chairman and Honorary Life Member of the Nittany Grotto, and is a Fellow, a Life Member, and currently the President of the National Speleological Society (NSS). He is a founding member and a life member of the Butler Cave Conservation Society (BCCS), Inc., the non-profit science, education, and conservation corporation that manages the largest and the deepest caves in the state of Virginia.
Professional Society or Association Memberships
IEEE Computer Society
ACM SIGGRAPH
President, Life Member, and Fellow of the NSS
Honorary Life Member of the Nittany Grotto, a chapter of the NSS
Member of the Fairfax Underground Network, a chapter of the NSS
Founding Member, Life Member, and past Vice-President of the BCCS
Technical and Semi-Technical Publications in the Cave Sciences
Selected Publications
"Comments and Suggested Guidelines for Judging Electronic Maps", Compass & Tape, Vol. 12, No. 3, pp. 22-25, Issue 39, 1996."The Meteorology of Harrison's Cave, Barbados, West Indies", Program of the 1995 NSS Convention, p. 25 (Abstract), 17-21 July 1995, Blacksburg, VA.
"The Computerization Of The Cave Map", Program of the 1995 NSS Convention, p. 29 (Abstract), 17-21 July 1995, Blacksburg, VA.
"A 3-D Symbol Set For Stage-4 Cave Maps", NSS Bulletin, Vol. 57, No. 1, p. 65 (Abstract), June 1995.
"The Meteorology of Harrison's Cave, Barbados, West Indies", Chapter 4, pp. 63-92 of A Study of Environmental Factors in Harrison's Cave, Barbados, West Indies, edited by H.H. Hobbs, National Speleological Foundation, December, 1994.
"Determining A Reference Direction Usng A GPS Receiver", Iceland 1993, Kalmanshellir Project Newsletter, No, 10, pp. 3-6, April 1993."Meteorological Conditions Far Inside A Large Cave System", BCCS Newsletter, Vol. 18, pp. 36-41, 1992.
"Passage Walls Construction For Stage-4 Cave Maps", NSS Bulletin, Vol. 53, No. 2, pp. 124-125 (Abstract), December 1991.
"A Profile of the Butler Cave Conservation Society, Inc.", Proceedings of the 1991 National Cave Management Symposium, 20 pages in press, Bowling
Green, KY, 23-26 October 1991."An Annotated Bibliography of Cave Meteorology", Cave Geology, Vol. 2, No. 2, pp. 83-119, June 1991.
"The Meteorology of the Butler Cave-Sinking Creek System", Proceedings of the Appalachian Karst Symposium, pp. 65-74, Radford University, Radford, VA, 23-26 March 1991.
"Miscellaneous Operations for Stage-4 Cave Maps", Compass & Tape, Vol. 8, No. 1, pp. 3-21, Summer 1990.
"Content Definition and Control for Stage-4 Cave Maps", Compass & Tape, Vol. 7, No. 4, pp. 3-23, Spring 1990.
"On the Measurement of Relative Humidity in Cave Meteorology Projects", Nittany Grotto Newsletter, Vol. 36, No. 1, pp. 6-14, Winter 1989; and Speleo Digest 1989, pp. 395-399.
"The Meteorology of the Butler Cave-Sinking Creek System", NSS Bulletin, Vol. 53, No. 1, p. 41 (Abstract), June 1991.
"Viewing Definition and Control for Stage-4 Cave Maps", Compass & Tape, Vol. 7, No. 3, pp. 3-19, Winter 1989-90.
"A North Arrow and Scale for Stage-4 Cave Maps", Compass & Tape, Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 3-12, Fall 1989.
"The Computerization of the Cave Map", Compass & Tape, Vol. 7, No. 1, pp. 3-14, Summer 1989.
"The Plumbing Of Provatina", Compass & Tape, Vol. 6, No. 3, pp 3-11, Winter, 1988.
"Still More On Cave Survey Blunders", Compass & Tape, Vol. 5, No. 4, pp. 94-113, Spring 1988.
"More On Cave Survey Blunders", Compass & Tape, Vol. 5, No. 4, pp. 69-93,
Spring 1988."On Cave Survey Blunders", Compass & Tape, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp. 23-43, Fall 1987.
"A Script Processor for the Manipulation of 3D Objects", Proceedings of the 3rd Annual TEMPLATE User Network Conference, San Diego, CA, February 1986, 22 pages.
"A User Interface for the Manipulation of 3D Objects", Proceedings of the 2nd Annual TEMPLATE User Network Conference, New Orleans, LA, February 1985, 25 pages.
"An Application of Interactive Computer Graphics to the Study of Caves", NSS Bulletin, Vol. 45, No. 2 (Insert), April 1983, with J.W. Igoe and P.A. Gillen.
"The Exploration and Mapping of the Sinking Creek System", NSS Bulletin, Vol. 44, No. 3, pp. 48-63, July 1982, with I.K. Nicholson.
"Surveying the Butler Cave-Sinking Creek System", NSS Bulletin, Vol. 44, No. 3, pp. 64-66, July 1982.
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