My story for Cosmos magazine on the work of research scientists in Papua New Guinea into that diabolical human foe, the malaria parasite. Photos by Mayeta Clark. Link here. Continue reading
Author Archives: Jo Chandler
Antarctica / Oceans / Science
The Totten Hots Up
“Find a nice, self-sufficient hilltop and fortify it.” – John Wyndham, ‘The Kraken Wakes’. My article in the latest edition of The Monthly – delving into the fast-flowing science of glacial melt, ice dynamics, warming oceans, and sea level rise. This piece has not been unlocked from behind the paywall: Link here. Continue reading
Up the Creek? A journey up the Murray Darling
A decade ago, former Prime Minister John Howard announced a strategy to save the Murray-Darling Basin, ravaged by drought and overuse, “once and for all”. Now some states and communities say the pain of restoring the river is too great. Scientists are warning Howard’s vision of saving the river hangs in the balance. My story … Continue reading
Do Re Mi in PNG
This week on ABC Radio National I have a story up on the documentary program Earshot that I’ve long wanted to tell. It’s about how Maria von Trapp – yes, as in How-do-you-solve-a-problem-like-Maria/The Sound of Music – washed up on a PNG island with several of her singing tribe; how her stepdaughter (she was called … Continue reading
Dateline Pacific
(Photograph by Vlad Sokhin) I’ve been travelling and storytelling from the Pacific for almost a decade. My most frequent destination is Papua New Guinea: beguiling, surprising, confronting, endowed with vast wilderness, immense resources, and the most culturally diverse population on the planet. I have travelled extensively in PNG, one of few reporters with a sustained … Continue reading
Climate stories from the frontline
(Photograph by Angela Wylie) ‘Antarctica unseen by humanity even 200 years ago, divines our future and archives our past. It matters to people as never before … The ice core I helped bore and bag, catalogued with my initials, will soon be translated into data, turned into graphs, and plugged into climate models. It will have a bit … Continue reading
Best Australian Essays 2016
What a buzz to find my work alongside pieces by the likes of Garner and Flanagan in this collection, published by BlackInc and out today. Editor Geordie Williamson says some lovely things about the very grim piece chosen for this anthology, “Grave Barrier Reef”, describing it as “balanced, finely-grained reportage … a monument of rational … Continue reading
Agriculture / Policy / Science
Betting The Farm: ABC Background Briefing
While working on a story on the impact of CSIRO cuts for Good Weekend a couple of months ago, I came across some startling science describing the scale and speed of shifts occurring on the Australian landscape as climate change bites. That was the kernel of what has become my second-ever radio documentary for ABC … Continue reading
Peter Doherty, 20 years after the Nobel Prize
One of the perks of the job is to meet the likes of Peter Doherty, and I’ve had the great luck to interview and chat with him a dozen times or so over the past several years. Indeed he kindly wrote a lovely endorsement of my climate book, a few years back. A gorgeous, brilliant, … Continue reading
Journalism / Science / Society
Best Australian Science Writing 2016
It was a privilege and great fun to be asked to edit this 6th edition of NewSouth Books’ highly successful ‘Best Australian Science Writing‘ series. It’s been a long haul, but you can find it now at all good bookshops – just in time for Christmas! Long list of big names included in this edition, … Continue reading
Notebook & Narrative by Jo Chandler 