Reino Antero Hirvonen

Who was Reino Antero Hirvonen?

Reino Antero Hirvonen was a famous Finnish physical geodesist, also well known for contributions in mathematical and astronomical geodesy.

He worked at first at the Finnish Geodetic Institute under W.A. Heiskanen on gravimetric geoid determination. In 1950 he succeeded Heiskanen as Professor of Geodesy at the Helsinki University of Technology.

He also took an active interest in astronomy, acting from 1956 to 1964 as a vice president of the Finnish amateur astronomical society Ursa.

Hirvonen R.A. participated in 1930s building and measuring the Finnish landscape to higher accuracy than before by building triangulation measuring towers and developing new mathematical algorithms for the manual calculations.

In 1947 he led the team of Finnish scientist to Brazil to measure the distance between South America and Africa. They succeed with measurements using a triangulation method based on measuring points in Brazil and Africa. The third point of the triangle was the solar eclipse happening that year, which was visible in both Africa and South America.