Tony Butt has a PhD in Physical Oceanography from the University of Plymouth, UK, and worked with the Coastal Processes Research Group at Plymouth for seven years. He has published 12 papers in peer-reviewed scientific journals and over 200 other articles on waves and the coastal environment for a non-scientific audience, plus several chapters, forewords and other contributions. He has been Staff Oceanographer for the Surfers Path magazine since 1998, and runs short courses on basic oceanography and meteorology for surfers and other coastal water users.Tony works with non-profit organizations such as Surfers Against Sewage, Save the Waves and the Surfrider Foundation, trying to convince people that the coastline is a highly-delicate and poorly understood part of the environment, and the more we interfere with it the more problems it will cause us.Tony is also a dedicated big-wave surfer and has appeared in numerous major television documentaries as well as being invited to several international big-wave events such as the prestigious Eddie Aikau Memorial in 1999.