Bergen County environmental activist Mark Becker killed in crash

Mark Becker, a Lamont-Doherty Observatory earth scientist and a well-known environmental activist in Bergen County, was killed Wednesday in a crash on the New York Thruway near Woodbury, N.Y., the authorities said.Becker,53, of Hillsdale, was the co-director of the environmental organization Bergen SWAN, with Lori Charkey, his partner of 30 years.

He was traveling to his part-time job as an adjunct professor at Bard College, in Annandale, N.Y., when he slowed down to avoid a snowplow with engine trouble, Charkey said she had been told by state police investigating the crash.
“He slowed down, but the tractor-trailer behind him did not, and I lost my companion of 30 years,” Charkey said.
The police said six other people suffered injuries, none of them life-threatening, in the multi-vehicle accident.Charkey said she and Becker had just returned from a 3½-week research trip to Antarctica, where they had worked with Chinese scientists investigating global warming.

“I’m glad he had that last chance to see that beautiful part of the world before he died,” Charkey said. Bergen Save the Watershed Action Network, the full name of the organization Becker and Charkey started 26 years ago, is dedicated to the preservation of the natural lands surrounding reservoirs in Bergen and Rockland counties, according to its website.

“I don’t know how I will be able to keep it going without him,” Charkey said, “but I hope I can shoulder it.Becker was a Columbia University earth studies scientist whose studies centered on using information technology to discern how human activities affect the environment.