Obituary for Prof. Dr.‐Ing. Dr. h.c. mult. Gottfried Konecny

at the age of 94.With his passing, photogrammetry and remote sensing has lost a brilliant scientist and science manager who was highly respected around the globe and tirelessly active, far beyond his retirement.Gottfried Konecny was a visionary who, in the second half of the 20th century, significantly shaped his field worldwide and who is considered the European father of remote sensing.From the very beginning, his professional life was centred on the sustainable development of our environment.He was also a practitioner, a manager and a diplomat with the ability and determination to achieve his goals.The foundation of his great success was no doubt his ability to not only set his visionary goals but to also achieve them.Gottfried Konecny was born on 17 June 1930 to German parents in Troppau, originally a small Moravian town with a diverse history and a population of around 30,000 at that time, now part of the Czech Republic.His youth in this multilingual region was characterised by the events before and during the Second World War, followed by flight