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IOOS^® - EYES ON THE OCEAN^™

From the IOOS Program Office:

• IOOS Federal Advisory Committee: The Committee met on April 29-30, 2015. Jessica Snowden took over as the Designated Federal Official – Well DONE.  VADM(Ret) Brown and Russell Callender started the meeting on the first day with encouraging words from NOAA. The Committee spent time discussing US Army Corps of Engineers and IOOS. Steve Stockton, Director of Civil Works, presented on USACE’s priorities and provided thoughts on how IOOS and USACE can work more closely. IOOC Co-Chairs Eric Lindstrom and Bob Houtman joined the committee for a discussion on the next set of Advisory Committee priorities, as well as public-private partnerships. The Advisory Committee heard from the Hydrographic Services Review Panel (HSRP) Vice Chair Bill Hanson and member Susan Shingledecker on HSRP priorities and similarities to IOOS Advisory Committee. The committee spent the remainder of their meeting discussing their priority areas for the next recommendations to NOAA and the IOOC. Presentations from the meeting will be posted on their website by next week here.
• Those in the DC region – MARACOOS meeting MOVED to Sheraton Annapolis:  MARACOOS Annual Meeting will be held May 7-8 at the Sheraton Annapolis.  Interested in attending see the agenda and register here.
• South East Region: Please register today for the SECOORA 2015 Annual Meeting. The two-day meeting will be held May 19-20, 2015, at the Hyatt Regency Jacksonville Riverfront in Jacksonville, FL (225 E Coastline Dr., Jacksonville, FL 32202).

Observation Subsystem and Sensor Technologies:

• Glider News:  GLOS glider operator Jay Austin and his Post-doc, Laura Fiorentino successfully reformatted their glider into the DAC standard netCDF format and have uploaded glider data.  The IOOS Program Office will be working to add more of their historical files and future glider missions going forward.

Data Management and Communications (DMAC) Subsystem and Tools Built on IOOS data:

(Contact Derrick or Rob to get on the list serve for changes - Derrick.Snowden@noaa.gov, Rob.Ragsdale@noaa.gov):

•  QARTOD:
  • Published: Updated Dissolved Oxygen Manual: QARTOD web page.
  • Review Continues on the Ocean Optics manual: Keep the emails coming.
  • Committee kicked off for the Dissolved Nutrients manual: The initial draft is very nearly ready for distribution to the committee for a first review.
  • Waves manual update:  We continue to solicit committee members from the original committee and elsewhere. We began making the known updates to the manual, marking the changes to ease the committee review task.
• DMAC Meeting is May 27-29th:  Will be held in Silver Spring, MD  with attendance from  the IOOS RA DAC managers and folks from NOAA (NDBC, PMEL, CO-OPs, NCEI, NOAA Fisheries) and USGS.  Topics include: DMAC operating, maintaining, and improving the system; MBON, ATN, and GliderDACs.  We will explore tools that are developing in the community and discuss making use of to improve DMAC’s capabilities.   For more information or to attend contact Rob.Ragsdale@noaa.gov.

Modeling and Analysis Subsystem:

(IOOS PO and IOOS Coastal and Ocean Modeling Testbed (COMT) POC – Becky Baltes (Becky.Baltes@noaa.gov):

• CariCOOS briefs NOAA on modeling capabilities: CariCOOS’ Miguel Canals briefed members of NOAA’s CO-OPS and CSDL’s modeling and analysis group on some of the wave forecasting tools and developments that he presented at CariCOOS’ annual meeting last month.  The briefing was well received and gave our federal partners good insight and awareness for these activities for consideration in their future plans.

Interagency and International Collaboration/News:

• Marine BON: NASA hosted the first annual MBON All-Hands meeting April 24 in College Park, MD.  In addition to NASA science team members, the 50+ participants included PIs and team members for the three MBON demo projects, US IOOS, NOAA (OER, Sanctuaries, NCCOS, NERRS, Ecological Forecasting Roadmap, NESDIS, etc.), Shell Oil, BOEM, Smithsonian’s Tennenbaum Marine Observatories Network/TMON, USGS, AOOS/Axiom, GCOOS, State of Florida, NOPP office, NatureServe, academia, and others. The full-day agenda included status updates from each of the MBON demo projects and discussions about long-term MBON sustainability; cross-project integration in areas including remote sensing, genomics, and automated biological sampling techniques; MBON/TMON collaborative opportunities; and data management.
• iTAG acoustic receiver loan (Gulf of Mexico): Canada’s Ocean Tracking Network (OTN) is providing data and technical support in addition to a receiver loan to be deployed later this year, part of the iTAG Network in the Gulf of Mexico led by Susan Barbieri (Florida Fish and Wildlife). iTAG is a collaboration between researchers on the Gulf Coast seeking to enhance their study objectives by leveraging each other’s receiver arrays and sharing data. Read more. View the entire newsletter here.
• Challenge to visualize Water Quality data ($10,000): This Challenge is in support of the President’s Climate Data Initiative.  This Challenge is being run by the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA), and Blue Legacy International.  https://ioos.noaa.gov.  Required Data Set: Visualizations must make use of at least one data set available through the Water Quality Portal. Additional Data Sets: Solvers may, at their discretion, use alternative publicly available open data sets (both governmental and non-governmental) and/or open APIs in conjunction with one or more data sets from the Water Quality Portal to reveal insights, trends, and relationships. The deadline for submission is June 8th, 2015.

Delivering Benefits:

• High Swell Conditions in Southern CA requires partnering:  Check out NOAA’s National Weather Service video on high swell conditions that incorporates USACE and CA Coastal Data Information Program models.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UveHc4qOkGg
• NOAA’s Report on Indicators for a Resilient Tourism Industry: NOAA’s  Office for Coastal Management has released the report Indicators for a Resilient Tourism Industry, that explores the factors that help the tourism industry rebound from such events. The study developed indicators to these factors using the Delphi Method, an iterative process that solicits expert opinions using standardized questions. Expert panels were developed for the central North Carolina coast and San Francisco Bay.
• 2014-2015 Pacific Anomalies Science and Technology Workshop: Unusual ocean weather and climate patterns have been observed throughout 2014 and early 2015 across the North Pacific basin. Areas of the North Pacific have been as much as 5⁰C warmer than average, earning the nickname ‘the blob’, and is affecting weather and climate patterns. Extreme conditions in physical and biogeochemical parameters are occurring in many locations, and appear to be impacting pelagic ecosystems, including fisheries. Plans are underway for a workshop on the North Pacific Ocean temperature anomaly and associated conditions. This is the first of a two part series, with the first workshop to be held in San Diego at Scripps on May 5-6, 2015 focusing on what is being observed, and the second will focus on causative factors. The May workshop is being developed by the five Pacific region ocean observing systems AOOS, NANOOS, CeNCOOS, SCCOOS, and PacIOOS), the IOOS office, IOOC, and the NOAA Climate Program Office.

Congressional:

• IOOS Spring Visits Continue:  The IOOS Program Office updates Congress several times a year on progress being made on the IOOS Enterprise and ICOOS legislation.  Carl and Jen briefed: Bonnie Bruce, Legislative Assistant, in Representative Young’s (R-AK); Nicole Tuetschel, Senior Advisor, and Krysia Pohl, Coast Guard Fellow in Senator Cantwell’s (D-WA) Office; and Thomas Farrugia, Sea Grant Knauss Marine Policy Fellow for the House Committee on Natural Resources Committee (Minority) on April 21.  Jen, along with Jess, briefed Lizzie Odendahl, Press Secretary and Legislative Assistant for Representative Hahn and Eliot Crafton, Sea Grant Fellow for Representative Capps on April 23. Carl and Jen briefed Julia Wyman, Ocean and Environmental Counsel for Senator Whitehouse, and Alexis Rudd, Sea Grant Fellow (Majority) and Wendy Lewis, NOAA Fellow (Majority) for the Senate Commerce Committee on April 27.  Interested in hearing about IOOS please contact Jen Rhoades, jenifer.rhoades@noaa.gov

Communications / Outreach / Education:

• Five Years After the Deepwater Horizon, Are Gulf States Prepared for the Next Oil Disaster? Read more at GCOOS.
• Get your copy of Coastal Ocean Observing Systems, 1st Edition: Coastal Ocean Observing Systems provides state-of-the-art scientific and technological knowledge in coastal ocean observing systems, along with guidance on establishing, restructuring, and improving similar systems. The book is intended to help oceanographers understand, identify, and recognize how oceanographic research feeds into the various designs of ocean observing systems. In addition, readers will learn how ocean observing systems are defined and how each system operates in relation to its geographical, environmental, and political region. The book provides further insights into all of these problem areas, offering lessons learned and results from the types of research sponsored and utilized by ocean observing systems and the types of research design and experiments conducted by professionals specializing in ocean research and affiliated with observing systems.
• Article on OA and shellfish growers that mentions IOOS and NANOOS: http://earthzine.org/2015/04/14/altered-waters-ocean-acidification-leads-shellfish-growers-to-adapt-for-survival/
  • Antarctic Edge: 70° South: Had a successful 2 week theatrical run at the Quad Cinemas in NY. Funded by the National Science Foundation.  Read the reviews:
    http://www.laemmle.com/blog/2015/04/antarctic-edge-70°-south-qa-opening-night-at-the-music-hall/
  • Radio Interviews about the educational basis for the making of Antarctic Edge include NPRs Leonard Lopate show: http://www.wnyc.org/story/inside-fastest-warming-place-earth/
  • INDIEWIRE April 2015 Film Preview: Antarctic Edge: 70° South (doc) - Directed by Dena Seidel - Dena Seidel’s documentary not only offers rare, beautifully shot footage of West Antarctic Peninsula’s rapidly changing environment, studying the connections that reveal the concrete impact of climate change; it is also a one-of-a-kind collaboration between the Rutgers University Film Bureau and the Rutgers Institute for Marine and Coastal Sciences and contains interviews and insights from some of the world’s leading ocean researchers. It is a fascinating look at their life’s work trying to understand how to maintain our planet.
    New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/17/movies/review-in-antarctic-edge-a-region-of-retreating-ice.html?_r=0
  • Earth Island Journal: http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/in_review_antarctic_edge_70_south/
  • Womensenews.org: http://womensenews.org/story/arts/150417/antarctic-edge-explores-how-much-hope-left

Upcoming Meetings with IOOS Participation:

• Planning for MTS/IEEE OCEANS’15 Washington DC:  Once again US IOOS will participate in this conference.  The US IOOS Program Office has secured 2 booths and will be looking for community engagement.  We are committed to the ever popular IGNITE session – as we did in Norfolk and have discussed townhall topics – potentially in coordination with the Maritime Alliance based on the Ocean Enterprise study.  Abstract submissions are now open and I call on all of you to submit one:  http://www.oceans15mtsieeewashington.org/index.php/program/abstract-submission Abstract submissions will close in late May.

View the IOOS calendar: https://ioosassociation.org/