Sally Garrett

Sally Garrett joined the New Zealand Defence Force's Defence Science and Technology (DST) organization in 2000 as a member of the Mine Counter Measures team. From 2007 to 2024, she led DST's Climate Intelligence and Battlespace Awareness teams.

Throughout her career, Sally has made contributions across a wide range of defence science areas, including operational METOC (Meteorological and Oceanographic) support, sensor performance, radar propagation, and naval architecture. In addition to her technical work, she has directly supported NZ Ministry of Defence acquisition projects and led significant field campaigns domestically and with international partners.

Sally specializes in understanding safety risks associated with NZDF operations in regions where environmental conditions approach safe operational limits. Over the past 10 years, her technical work has focused on the Southern Ocean and the Ross Sea, particularly in assessing and mitigating risks related to remote operations in areas that may experience high sea states. Her research has emphasized collaborative partnerships with academia and industry. In recognition of her contributions to this field, Sally received the Walter Atkinson Award from the Royal Institute of Naval Architects in 2020 for excellence in naval architecture.

In 2016, she was honoured with the NZ Minister of Defence Award for her collaborative development and commercialization of the amphibious warfare tactical decision aid, SurfZone View. This tool is currently used globally and is supported by the commercial partner NZ MetService.

Since taking on the role of Division Chief of Science Delivery for the Information Warfare Division, Sally has fostered partnerships within the broader scientific ecosystem across the Division. She focuses on ensuring excellence in the underlying science while developing staff to have diverse skill sets to enhance agility in the Division's research areas.

Ms. Garrett holds an MSc (Hons) in Environmental Science from the University of Auckland.