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IOOS^® - EYES ON THE OCEAN^™

From the IOOS Program Office:

• IOOS Advisory Committee: The meeting will be held April 5-6, 2016 at the Consortium for Ocean Leadership. Meeting is open to the public. The committee will focus on increased connections with BOEM and progress on work group topics such as examining lessons learned from the Caribbean region which may apply to other IOOS regions, administration of the Ocean Technology Transition project, and the landscape of biological, ecological, and chemical observations. Manson Brown and Russell Callender will speak at the start of day one. Info and agenda.
• CONGRATS MARACOOS, NERACOOS, PacIOOS and SECOORA: The National Ocean Service’s Office for Coastal Management (OCM) announced the FY2016 winners of the Regional Coastal Resilience Grants. Using the proposal process initiated in 2015, OCM made awards using FY2015 and FY2016 funds. They received 132 proposals requesting a total of $105 million, and committing $60 million of in-kind support. Six regional projects were awarded FY 2015 funds early in February. Tuesday they announced the recommendation of six additional projects for FY 2016 for a total grant amount of $9M. The impact of the 2016 grants will be felt in over 120 coastal communities, bringing the total to well over 200 communities for the first two years of funding. You can find out more about the awards at the following links: NOAA Press Release, OCM Resilience Grants Web Page, Project Details for FY15 and 16 awards.

Observation Subsystem and Sensor Technologies:

• HF Radar (IOOS national coordinator, Jack Harlan; Jack.Harlan@noaa.gov):
  • The next ORCAP (Ocean Radar Conference for Asia-Pacific; formerly ORCA) meeting is 14-16 April in Wuhan, China.  IOOS partners from Scripps, Rutgers, and U-Hawaii are likely to attend, as well as CODAR reps.
  • Jack will hold a HFR radar Q&A telecom Wed 23 Mar 1400 EDT on general HFR topics for the HFR community.  Topics include: Frequency Licenses; Wind turbine interference – BOEM funding a new project; Range series file archiving – nearing final plan; Archiving of radial & total velocities – monthly (NDBC to NCEI);     NCEP Modeling: WCOFS; AWIPS; APMs from AIS, drones; Diagnostics web pages; Spare CODAR parts program; ROWG Sponsorship.  New Projects: Tsunami detection, Significant Wave Height
    •  Hosted by SCRIPPS;  US & Canada Toll-Free Number – 8667401260; access code 8223101

• Glider Updates:
  • Glider Data Community: The 2nd glider data community call was held last week focusing on the QARTOD manual.  Great turnout with 30 people on the line.  If you missed it and you’d like to hear it, you can find it here.  If you would like to be added to the glider data distro, please let Rob Ragsdale know at Rob.Ragsdale@noaa.gov.

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 Update: lead Mark Bushnell - mark.bushnell@noaa.gov
  • Glider QC Manual: 2nd round of reviews being conducted on the draft document circulated by Becky to RAs, DMAC, and others; logging them to the adjudication matrix; addressing them and editing the draft manual.
  • HFR Surface Currents QC Manual: Editing draft manual; Distributed 3 draft vendor statements to the vendors to encourage their participation.
  • Water level QC Manual: Updated draft has been distributed to the RAs, DMAC, and others for the 2nd round of review.
  • Outreach: Corresponded with Etienne Charpentier, Chief of the Observing Systems Division at WMO, regarding the possibility of QARTOD manuals also serving as JCOMM Technical Reports.
  • Other: Distributed draft white paper on the relationship between QARTOD, RICE, and the Glider DAC QC effort to the QARTOD Board of Advisors for comment.

Modeling and Analysis Subsystem:

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

• Kick off for Transition Management Group (TMG) and Technical Steering Group (TSG):  Becky held a kick off for the COMT’s TMG and TSG.  The groups will begin meeting regularly in April to provide oversight and governance to the COMT PIs and projects, help align transition pathways and provide technical review of ongoing projects.
• NOAA’s Ecological Forecasting Road Map: Mark your calendars! The annual EF meeting will be held on April 26-28 in College Park, MD.  Updates from the Habitat Science and Ecological Forecasting team:
  • Correigh Greene (NMFS) is now a member of the HS&EF Team and can provide a west coast perspective on our work.
  • Barbara Muhling’s work at GFDL is continuing in downscaling global climate models for use on an estuary scale. She's working on the distribution of herring larvae in relation to water quality factors and water temperature.
  • HS&EF is involved with MBON project on biodiversity observations and forecasting in the Santa Barbara Channel.

Interagency and International Collaboration/News:

• Marine Biodiversity (MBON) Leads Gabrielle Canonico, IOOS Office; Woody Turner NASA; and Jim Price, BOEM – Upcoming events:
  • Gabrielle to attend April 24 technical marine monitoring workshop - hosted by GOOS and the Convention on Biological Diversity - in Montreal.  Other NOAA attendee is Ken Sherman, NMFS.  Permission was granted by State Dept to attend day one of the Twentieth meeting of the CBD Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological Advice in hopes of hearing some of the marine and coastal biodiversity discussion including: Ecologically or biologically significant marine areas; Specific work plan on biodiversity and acidification in cold-water areas; Addressing impacts of marine debris and anthropogenic underwater noise on marine and coastal biodiversity; Marine spatial planning and training initiatives.
  • Francisco Chavez will represent MBON at the AtlantOS General Assembly in Kiel, Germany, during the last week of June. This includes participation in a dedicated fisheries/biodiversity discussion.  The following week (July 4-8), Francisco, Frank and Gabrielle will convene an MBON workshop during the GEO BON Open Sciences meeting in Liepzig, Germany.
  • MBON Pole to Pole Americas meeting will take place in Puerto Morales the week of September 26.   We are trying to bring in as many countries as possible and that is the largest effort right now. U.S. participants will include Gabrielle, U.S. MBON project PIs and team members, Emmett Duffy (Smithsonian/TMON), and Roger Sayre (USGS/Global Ecological Mapping Units).
• WIGOS/JCOMM RMIC:  Richard Bouchard presented our QARTOD presentation. RMIC Special Edition of the QARTOD Waves Manual with IOOS cover letter is posted at http://media.wix.com/ugd/a8aad7_eee89a0a97824bcf93ed62c5de3870a8.pdf.  One outcome of the is meeting is that Etienne Charpentier, Chief of the Observing Systems Division at WMO has raised the possibility of QARTOD manuals also serving as JCOMM Technical Reports.

Delivering Benefits:

• Catch the Next Wave & Oceanology International (OI) 2016:  Ralph Rayner and his steering team hit a homerun with Catch the Next Wave.  The setting was in hallowed halls for scientists – The Royal Institution.  The event brings together notable scientists from the oceanographic community with experts from outside the community along a particular theme.  We explored artificial intelligence, robotic surgery, measuring volcanic ash and oceans on other planets.  The presentations will be posted so check back often.

Oceanology International 2016 broke attendance records once again.  Justin Manley and I moderated the Marine Technology and Services Sector Role in the ‘Blue Economy’ program where, between the panels and speakers, being part of the Blue Economy is starting to take shape.  Tim Moltmann, Director Australia’s Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS), got us started with an overview of what dedicated government funding has produced in Australia – the audience was impressed – well done.  We were fortunate to have senior leadership from AtlantOS, SmartBay Ireland, POGO, US IOOS and Ocean Education on a panel in the morning that provided their thoughts on how the observing community is already part of the Blue Economy.  Read more.

• NOAA Releases New ‘Rip Current Survival Guide’ Video: NOAA’s Ocean Today recently released three new videos highlighting rip current safety, including the Rip Current Survival Guide. The Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services (CO-OPS) and the National Weather Service contributed to the videos’ storyboards and scripts. High-definition rip current footage is featured in Rip Current Science. The University of North Carolina Coastal Studies Institute captured the footage as part of a NOAA Coastal Storms Program proposal supported by CO-OPS. The videos are important tools to help save lives in advance of this year’s beach season. They were motivated by recent social science research on how best to communicate rip current hazards and prevention to reduce the number of rip current drownings.
• Aerial Imagery Helps Assess Impacts of El Niño: The National Geodetic Survey (NGS) deployed the NOAA Office of Marine and Aviation Operation’s King Air aircraft to complete the collection of geo-referenced oblique imagery of the West Coast. More than 3,000 images were collected from the U.S.-Mexico border to Cape Flattery, WA. The imagery will be used to assess impacts of the ongoing El Niño event in several NOS mission areas, including navigation and coastal zone management. The imagery also supports the work of mission partners, including other NOAA offices, the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Federal Emergency Management Agency, and state, local, and academic interests. The data are in the public domain, and baseline imagery from September 2015 is available for comparison purposes.
• Ocean Observing and Hurricanes: MARACOOS member, Rutgers University, was published in Nature, and picked up in other press on their efforts using the IOOS infrastructure to support understanding Hurricane Intensity from Hurricane Irene.  Read the paper and various news reports:
  • Nature Communications Front Page, http://www.nature.com/ncomms/index.html
  • AAAS Eurekalert breaking news (on the right), http://eurekalert.org/
  • Why Hurricane Irene fizzled as it neared New Jersey in 2011 — Blog PHYS.ORG, http://phys.org/news/2016-03-hurricane-irene-fizzled-neared-jersey.html
  • Rutgers study reveals why many hurricanes weaken before landfall: NEWARK STAR-LEDGER, http://www.nj.com/weather/index.ssf/2016/03/rutgers_researchers_reveal_why_many_summer_hurrica.html
• Portland Press Herald – March 3, 2016:  Good chance lobster season will start ‘extremely early,’ researchers say http://www.pressherald.com/2016/03/03/warm-weather-will-prompt-early-lobster-season/ The article says warmer Gulf of Maine waters indicate a potential early start to lobster season. The forecast itself uses buoy observation data from the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS), through the Northeastern Regional Association of Coastal and Ocean Observing Systems.

Congressional:

• No update.

Communications / Outreach / Education:

• IOOS, SECOORA, and Univ. of South Florida (USF) host 2 NOAA Hollings Interns for the summer of 2016:  The two interns will be working directly with co-mentor Jay Law at USF and Vembu Subramanian of SECOORA.  Julianna Diehl, Maine Maritime Academy, will be working with the Ocean Circulation Group at USF gaining hands-on experience setting up instrumentation, outfitting moorings for deployment, creating cruise and dive plans and executing those plans on board the R/V Weatherbird II during an annual mooring cruise to take place in the summer of 2016. Andrew Reid, East Carolina University, will be working on a project to execute a 3-4 week deployment of state of the art ocean acidification sensors on an existing ocean-atmosphere research mooring in the Gulf of Mexico. Utilizing the Coastal Ocean Monitoring and Prediction System (COMPS) field program maintained by USF, Andrew will assist and take a lead role in the planning, execution and recovery of pH and Dissolved Inorganic Carbon (DIC) sensors.

Upcoming Meetings with IOOS Participation:

• Challenges of Natural Resource Economics and Policy (CNREP) 5th National Forum on Socioeconomic Research in Coastal Systems (March 21-22, New Orleans, LA): Carl Gouldman, IOOS Deputy Director, is attending the CNREP forum this week in New Orleans, LA to brief the IOOS Ocean Enterprise Study results. The goal of the triennial CNREP forum is to marshal the social sciences towards the most timely and relevant socioeconomic challenges of coastal resource management and policy. Carl will speak on a panel focused on “Economic Assessments of the Blue-Green Economy”. For more info and to see the agenda, click here.

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