Hans had a monumental impact on the field we now call boundary-layer meteorology. Another student from the New York University years, Morton L. Barad, now president of Barad Consultants, Inc. and previously Chief of the Meteorology Laboratory of the Air Force Cambridge Research Laboratories, reveals a little-known story about Hans' entry into the field:
In 1948, as I was beginning my search for a doctoral thesis subject, Bernard Haurwitz, then chairman of the Department of Meteorology at New York University, informed me that the services of a meteorologist would be required in a new air quality study at N.Y.U. to be sponsored by the Consolidated Edison Company of New York. I joined the research team and soon had a thesis topic in the field of air quality research to propose to the department.
However, since none of the department's faculty members had done research in this field, it was necessary for me to find a willing thesis adviser. Hans Panofsky became that person. Thirty-three years later, while attending a meeting of the American Meteorological Society, HAP introduced me to two of his current graduate students as the fellow who was responsible for his switching his research interest from the atmosphere of Jupiter to the boundary layer of Earth. Since the meteorological world now knows of his many accomplishments in the field he adopted so many years ago, I feel good knowing that something I did for myself has had such positive consequences.