[3] She was first woman to be awarded an Australian Bureau of Meteorology cadetship, enabling her to study for a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Melbourne.

[5] Moving to England, she achieved fame as a weather forecaster for BBC radio in London, employed—as was usual at the time—by the Met Office.

[7] During that period, she appeared as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme Desert Island Discs on 25 December 1968.

[6] She also met and married fellow Australian John Kemp, while working in the UK.

[2][8] After returning to Australia on 1 December 1969, on board the SS Oriana,[9] she again worked at the Bureau of Meteorology, and then ran a consultancy, called Weatherex, with Don Douglas, studying the storms of the New South Wales coast,[1] before returning to the bureau for a third stint in September 1988.