Rate My Professor Sean Fitzsimons

Professor Sean Fitzsimons is a Professor in the School of Geography at the University of Otago, having been employed there since February 1991 and appointed Professor in 2012. He earned a BSc (Hons) from the University of Canterbury and a PhD from the University of Tasmania. Previously, he served as Head of the Department of Geography. His research specializations include geomorphology, glacial processes, storm and seismic disturbances of landscapes, alpine landscape development, reconstructing landscape change from lake sediments, glaciology, paleoseismology, glacial sedimentology, subglacial processes, basal ice deformation, microbial habitats in glaciers, climate records from lake sediments, and earthquake impacts on mountain landscapes.

Sean Fitzsimons has produced 141 publications, garnering over 3,700 citations. Notable publications are 'Long term carbon export from mountain forests driven by hydroclimate and extreme event driven landsliding' (Communications Earth & Environment, 2025), 'Deformation, strength and tectonic evolution of basal ice in Taylor Glacier, Antarctica' (Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, 2024), 'Lacustrine mass movements in active tectonic settings: Lake tsunami sources in New Zealand's South Island' (Geomorphology, 2024), 'Sedimentary ancient DNA reveals the impact of anthropogenic land use disturbance and ecological shifts on fish community structure in small lowland lake' (Science of the Total Environment, 2024), 'Mechanisms of basal ice formation in polar glaciers: An evaluation of the apron model' (Journal of Geophysical Research, 2008), and 'Spatiotemporal clustering of great earthquakes on a transform fault controlled by geometry' (2021). He has supervised multiple PhD and MSc students, including theses on lacustrine tsunami hazards, landscape perturbations in Fiordland, community resilience after the Kaikoura Earthquake, paleoseismology of fault systems, and structural glaciology of the McMurdo Ice Shelf.