| Abstrakt: |
In September 1940, 42nd Geological Section of the South African Engineer Corps moved from Kenya to an operational base near Cairo in Egypt, continuing to serve within the British Army's Middle East Command but with leadership by the newly-promoted Major Gordon Lyall Paver (1913–1988). The main part of the Section was employed to support the British 8th Army and operations west of the River Nile, particularly in the Western Desert of Egypt and Libya to Tunisia but also from bases elsewhere in Egypt, with surveys principally by means of electrical earth resistivity: guiding the deployment of Boring Sections Royal Engineers and other units in drilling boreholes from which to abstract potable groundwater. Detachments with similar roles were also employed further east of the Nile, in Sinai, Palestine, Transjordan, Syria and Lebanon, Iraq and Iran. In the Mediterranean region more generally, from 1943 additional deployments included Malta, Sicily and Cyprus, and later Greece. As conflict in North Africa came to an end in the spring of 1943, and so as to promote the use of geology and geophysics (rather than water diviners) as the best means for guiding the choice of sites for boreholes, Paver led teaching of a military training course in geophysical survey methods and the compilation of an authoritative textbook. In early 1945, as conflict in the European Theatre of Operations entered its final months, Paver assisted planning in England for potential deployment of the Section to the Far East and for the development there of an enhanced military geological staff—although hostilities came to an end before these plans materialized. Towards the end of his service, Paver completed for publication the final six of an 11-part series of articles on 'Water supply in the Middle East campaigns' that placed much military hydrogeological information on permanent public record. Demobilized in February 1946, Paver returned to a career as a consultant geophysicist, notably promoting 'resistivity' surveys to locate 'underground water', surveys including significant fieldwork in Egypt, Pakistan and Cyprus that developed his wartime skill base. He had pioneered and mostly directed the use of electrical earth resistivity surveys in support of British military operations during World War II and begun to influence a generation of Royal Engineers through his textbook: re-printed by the United Kingdom's War Office in April 1945 to facilitate its long-term and wider use. Military honours were duly bestowed upon him for 'gallant and distinguished services' during the war. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
