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The latest news releases from NOAA - the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Ship captains and pleasure boaters can now get free real-time information on water and weather conditions for Cherry Point, Wash., from a newly installed NOAA ocean observing system that makes piloting a ship safer and more efficient.
The combined global land and ocean surface temperature was the sixth warmest October on record, according to NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. Based on records going back to 1880, the monthly National Climatic Data Center analysis is part of the suite of climate services NOAA provides.
The ocean and the land are natural sponges, or sinks, that absorb carbon dioxide, or CO2, from the atmosphere. But a group of international scientists, including two from NOAA, have found that the emissions are outpacing the ability of the sinks to soak up the excess CO2.
The Antarctic ozone hole, which fluctuates throughout the late winter and spring in the southern hemisphere, reached its 2009 peak circumference in late September, according to measurements by NOAA researchers. Slightly smaller than the North American continent, the ozone hole covered 9.2 million square miles, according to NOAA satellite observations. This ranks as the 10th largest since satellite measurements began in 1979.
NOAA today released the World Ocean Database 2009, the largest, most comprehensive collection of scientific information about the oceans with records dating as far back as 1800. This product is part of the climate services provided by NOAA.
A year-long shutdown in recreational razor clam digging, a major tourist attraction and local tradition in Washington state, could potentially result in as much as $22 million in lost revenue to coastal counties, according to a new report by NOAA and the University of Washington. Reduced lodging, transportation, and dining sales would also translate to a direct loss in labor income of $13.3 million to residents of affected areas, including a small commercial fishery.
According to a new study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, NOAA and NOAA-funded university scientists are closer to understanding why “red tides,” called harmful algal blooms form. These toxic harmful algal blooms threaten marine ecosystems, human health, and cost local and regional economies millions of dollars annually through fishery closures, recreation and tourism losses.
NOAA deployed the seventh in a series of smart buoys to monitor weather conditions and water quality in the Chesapeake Bay today. The buoy, located at the mouth of Severn River near Annapolis, Md., will be used by commercial and recreational boaters to navigate safely and provide data for educators and scientists to monitor the Bay's changing conditions.
Dr. Jane Lubchenco, under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator issued the following statement urging the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) to heed the scientific advice and adopt measures that will end overfishing in the Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean and put bluefin tuna on the path to recovery. The ICCAT is scheduled to meet this week in Brazil.
Senior NOAA officials today commissioned NOAA Ship Pisces, the nation’s most advanced fisheries research vessel, and dedicated a new fisheries laboratory in Pascagoula, Miss.
NOAA scientists took off Saturday on the second phase of a mission that, when complete, will provide a detailed view of how carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are distributed globally. Monitoring the increasing levels of greenhouse gases and black carbon aerosols in the atmosphere is crucial to understanding human-caused climate change.
Scientists researching the causes and impacts of the dead zone in the northern Gulf of Mexico have been awarded more than $2.4 million for the first year of an anticipated $12 million multi-year NOAA research investment.
NOAA has awarded the Smithsonian Institution’s Environmental Research Center and several partner organizations $946,000 for the first year of an anticipated five-year, $5 million collaborative project to study the degradation of nearshore coastal habitats in the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays.
NOAA and The Nature Conservancy have entered into an agreement to protect the health of the nation’s valuable but increasingly vulnerable coral reef ecosystems in the Caribbean, Florida, Hawaii and the Pacific Islands.
Representatives from NOAA and the states of North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, announced the formation of a partnership to better manage and protect ocean and coastal resources, ensure regional economic sustainability, and respond to disasters such as hurricanes.
NOAA issued a statement about the outcome of the annual meeting of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT). The ICCAT meeting concluded last night in Brazil.
NOAA and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration unveiled an interagency agreement today to strengthen seafood inspection and improve seafood safety and quality.
The October 2009 average temperature for the contiguous United States was the third coolest on record for that month according to NOAA’s State of the Climate report issued today. Based on data going back to 1895, the monthly National Climatic Data Center analysis is part of the suite of climate services provided by NOAA.
Despite the fact that summer 2009 had more sea ice than in 2007 or 2008, scientists are seeing drastic changes in the region from just five years ago and at rates faster than anticipated. The findings were presented today in the annual update of the Arctic Report Card, a collaborative effort of 71 national and international scientists.
A Senior Scientist at NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory, Dr. Solomon accepted the 2009 Volvo environment prize for her pioneering scientific contributions and subsequent impacts on environmental policies.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking comments now through November 19 on its proposed rule to authorize impacts to marine mammals during Navy training exercises around the Mariana Islands. The NOAA proposal includes protective measures designed to minimize effects on marine mammals.
Today, students from Carmel Middle School in Carmel, Ind., welcomed home Christine Hedge, a seventh-grade science teacher who spent six weeks in the Arctic Ocean on board the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker Healy as part of a multi-year, multi-agency effort to collect seafloor mapping and oceanographic data along the North American Extended Continental Shelf.
Ship captains and pleasure boaters can now get free real-time information on water and weather conditions for the lower Mississippi River from a new NOAA ocean observing system that makes piloting a ship safer and more efficient.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced that two of three populations totaling more than 200,000 spotted seals in and near Alaska are not currently in danger of extinction or likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future. The announcement follows an 18-month status review.
The United States today announced that it will seek the strongest possible management for the conservation of Atlantic bluefin tuna, a fish which is in serious trouble.
After analyzing historical records and climate model data for two major U.S. droughts in the 1930s and 1950s, NOAA scientists found two very different causes, shedding new light on our understanding of what triggers drought.
The average September temperature of 66.4 degrees F was 1.0 degree F above the 20th Century average. Precipitation across the contiguous United States in September averaged 2.48 inches, exactly the 1901-2000 average.
NOAA today announced 11 grants totaling more than $9 million that will create new education projects in aquariums across the nation. The projects will educate visitors about the ocean and encourage better stewardship of the marine environment.
A new NOAA report on the health of California’s Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary indicates that the overall condition of the sanctuary’s marine life and habitat ranges from good (highest rating) to fair (moderate rating), but identifies several threats to sanctuary resources, such as growing coastal populations, agricultural and urban runoff, vessel traffic and marine debris.
El Niño to Help Steer U.S. Winter Weather
The combined global land and ocean surface temperature was the second warmest September on record, according to NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
New regulations to protect the great white shark are now in effect in NOAA’s Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, a marine protected area just west of San Francisco.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today released its recovery plan for Middle Columbia River steelhead, a fish that was first given protection under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) in 1999.
NOAA has awarded $457,000 in competitive grant funding to support three projects to better track and manage outbreaks of toxic red tide algae that threaten public health and New England’s shellfish industry.
NOAA is awarding $178,358 for the first year of a project to improve predictions of toxic algal blooms in the western Gulf of Mexico as part of an evolving national ecological forecasting capability. NOAA anticipates a nearly $1 million investment in this large-scale regional project over the next four years. The project is funded by the interagency Ecology and Oceanography of Harmful Algal Blooms, or ECOHAB, program.
NOAA announced today the temporary closure of the black sea bass recreational fishery in federal waters north of Cape Hatteras, N.C., for 180 days in response to recent landings data that showed recreational fishermen may catch more than double their annual quota by the end of the year. The closure will commence Monday, October 5, 2009.
Unusually high temperatures in the Arctic and heavy rains in the tropics likely drove a global increase in atmospheric methane in 2007 and 2008 after a decade of near-zero growth, according to a new study. Methane is the second most abundant greenhouse gas after carbon dioxide, albeit a distant second.
NOAA has awarded a $13.1 million contract to Vigor Marine, LLC, in Portland, Ore., to perform major repairs and upgrades to the NOAA hydrographic survey vessel Rainier.
NOAA announced a $4.4 million award to Complete Building Corporation from Charleston, S.C. for construction of NOAA’s Gulf of Mexico Disaster Response Center in Mobile, Ala. The facility will be the regional home to the agency’s Office of Response and Restoration — the NOAA organization charged with responding to oil spills, hazardous material releases, and marine debris.
Today two of the world’s largest marine protected areas announced a historic alliance to enhance the management and protection of almost 300,000 square miles of marine habitat in the Pacific Ocean.
Scientists from NOAA’s Fisheries Service have captured a giant squid while conducting research off the Louisiana coast in the Gulf of Mexico. This is only the second known giant squid obtained from the Gulf of Mexico – the first was collected in 1954 off the Mississippi Delta where it was found floating dead at the surface.
Today, NOAA and its partners celebrated the successful completion of a multi-year project to compensate the public for hazardous waste released into Hempstead Harbor, N.Y. The project restored salt marsh and coastal shoreline, and created important habitats for spawning, nursing and foraging fish and other wildlife.
Predicting harmful algal blooms, or HABs, in the Great Lakes is now a reality as NOAA announces an experimental HAB forecast system in Lake Erie.
NOAA and the National Science Foundation have awarded $824,225 in competitive funds for the first year of an anticipated four-year $2.8 million project to develop early warning forecast models for toxic harmful algal blooms, or HABs, on Pacific Northwest beaches.
NOAA Administrator Dr. Jane Lubchenco joined today with federal, state and local officials and volunteers at Hunt’s Mills Dam on the Ten Mile River in East Providence, R.I., to celebrate a $3 million American Reinvestment and Recovery Act project, restoring a migratory fish passage that will eventually accommodate 400,000 herring and shad along both the Ten Mile and Pawcatuck rivers.
NOAA has awarded Massachusetts-based Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution $120,000 as part of an anticipated three-year, nearly $500,000 project, to determine how nitrogen and phosphorus promote brown tides on the East Coast. Funds were awarded through the interagency Ecology and Oceanography of Harmful Algal Blooms (ECOHAB) program.
A physical oceanographer who worked with satellites to generate climate, weather, and water products for operational and research use, will be the director of NOAA’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich. Marie Colton, Ph.D., who has been acting director since January, takes the permanent position on October 11.
NOAA has joined with private industry and conservation groups to launch Whale SENSE, a new voluntary program that encourages whale-watch tour operators from Maine to Virginia to practice responsible viewing. The program will also recognize businesses that discourage the harassment of whales in the wild and promote good stewardship.
Nine exceptional graduate students have been selected by NOAA to participate in the agency’s 2009 Graduate Science Program. The GSP students are pursuing graduate degrees in atmospheric, environmental, or oceanic sciences or remote sensing technology – scientific fields that are integral to NOAA’s mission.
Obama Administration officials today released the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force Interim Report for a 30-day public review and comment period. The Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force, led by White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair Nancy Sutley, consists of 24 senior-level officials from Administration agencies, departments, and offices. The report provides proposals for a comprehensive national approach to uphold our stewardship responsibilities and ensure accountability for our actions.
“Today is a historic day. For the first time, we as a nation say loudly and clearly that healthy oceans matter."
A NOAA-led research mission has located and identified the final resting place of the YP-389, a U.S. Navy patrol boat sunk approximately 20 miles off the coast of Cape Hatteras, NC, by a German submarine during World War II.
Scientists have used a new approach to sharpen the understanding of one of the most uncertain of mankind’s influences on climate—the effects of atmospheric “haze,” the tiny airborne particles from pollution, biomass burning, and other sources.
NOAA, along with the Environmental Protection Agency, the International City/County Management Association and Rhode Island Sea Grant, has released a guide to bring smart growth to coastal and waterfront communities.
A powerful fish-killing toxin could have cancer-killing properties as well, according to collaborative research led by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s microbiologist Paul V. Zimba and NOAA chemist Peter Moeller.
The world’s ocean surface temperature was the warmest for any August on record, and the warmest on record averaged for any June-August (Northern Hemisphere summer/Southern Hemisphere winter) season according to NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. The preliminary analysis is based on records dating back to 1880.
Backed by sound science, strong stakeholder support and extensive outreach, the federal government today filed with a United States district court a strengthened plan to implement NOAA’s 2008 biological opinion governing operation of the Federal Columbia River Power System.
NOAA has completed implementation of the final phase of a nine year, $180 million contract by installing the newest generation of IBM supercomputers for weather and climate prediction.
Charter boat companies feeling the sting of unfair competition have looked to NOAA’s Fisheries Service Office of Law Enforcement for help.
The average June-August 2009 summer temperature for the contiguous United States was below average – the 34th coolest on record, according to a preliminary analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. August was also below the long-term average. The analysis is based on records dating back to 1895.
Saltwater recreational fishing is among the most popular outdoor sports in America with anglers representing one of NOAA's largest organized constituencies. Not only are anglers stewards of our ocean, they contribute greatly to the economic vitality of our coastal communities. For these reasons, I believe it is in NOAA's best interests to adopt polices and practices that will protect ocean ecosystems and ensure one of America's most treasured pastimes endures for future generations.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has selected seven outstanding graduate students from around the nation to embark on a new and exciting phase of their academic career as participants in NOAA’s Dr. Nancy Foster Scholarship program.
Persistent winds and a weakened current in the Mid-Atlantic contributed to higher than normal sea levels along the Eastern Seaboard in June and July, according to a new NOAA technical report.
Officials from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) unveiled a new ground station in Guam that will track spacecraft from JAXA’s upcoming Quasi-Zenith Satellite System.
Two related research expeditions by NOAA scientists to track the habitat preferences and movements of fish at Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary may help managers protect overfished species such as red snapper and grouper. Research from the two expeditions appears in the current online edition of the peer-reviewed Bulletin of Marine Sciences.
The first catch-share program for the tilefish fishery was approved by NOAA’s Fisheries Service today, after its adoption was recommended by the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council.
Recent observations have suggested that the air above Alaska may already hold the first signs of a regional increase in greenhouse gas emissions that could contribute to climate change around the globe. To learn more about the region's emissions, NOAA's Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colo., has teamed up with the U.S. Coast Guard at Kodiak Island. The two partners are flying NOAA air-sampling devices aboard a Coast Guard C-130 aircraft conducting flights over the state through November.
The owners and operators of the commercial fishing vessel Risa Lynn will pay a $10,000 civil penalty as a settlement for illegally fishing in a marine protected area off the Santa Barbara coastline in the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary.
NOAA today announced its intent to develop a comprehensive national policy for sustainable marine aquaculture in the coming months, providing a framework for addressing aquaculture activity in federal waters. Marine aquaculture is the cultivation of marine organisms, such as finfish and shellfish, that are consumed by Americans on a daily basis.
Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary is among the healthiest coral reef ecosystems in the tropical Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, according to a new NOAA report.
Surveyors and scientists from NOAA’s Office of Coast Survey and Oregon State University over the next two years will create the most detailed maps ever generated of the seafloor along Oregon’s coast. Using the latest technologies, they will measure water depth, search for navigational hazards, and record the natural features of coastal seabeds and fragile aquatic life. The images will help researchers and coastal managers protect coastal communities and marine habitat.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service will implement catch shares in the Gulf of Mexico commercial grouper and tilefish fisheries beginning January 1, 2010, in an effort to reduce overcapacity and improve profitability and working conditions for commercial fishermen of these species.
Nitrous oxide has now become the largest ozone-depleting substance emitted through human activities, and is expected to remain the largest throughout the 21st century, NOAA scientists say in a new study.
NOAA ships and scientists have returned to Alaska’s Kachemak Bay to kick off year two of Hydropalooza — a NOAA-led project to develop the most detailed seafloor and coastline maps ever generated of the area.
A NOAA-led team of scientists has found that the apparent increase in the number of tropical storms and hurricanes since the late 19th and early 20th centuries is likely attributable to improvements in observational tools and analysis techniques that better detect short-lived storms.
The July 2009 temperature for the contiguous United States was below the long-term average, based on records going back to 1895, according to a preliminary analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
The owners and operators of the commercial fishing vessel Risa Lynn will pay a $10,000 civil penalty as a settlement for illegally fishing in a marine protected area off the Santa Barbara coastline in the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary.
NOAA will lead a three-week research expedition in August to study World War II shipwrecks sunk in 1942 off the coast of North Carolina during the Battle of the Atlantic.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is proposing new rules on vessel traffic aimed at further protecting Southern Resident killer whales in Washington’s Puget Sound. These large marine mammals, the subject of intense curiosity from kayakers to tourists crowding the decks of commercial whale-watching vessels, were added to the Endangered Species list in late 2005.
Commerce Secretary Gary Locke announced in Norfolk, Va. today $40 million for critical hydrographic survey and chart projects across the United States that strengthen the economy, create jobs, and support safe and efficient marine commerce and trade. Funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) will allocate $32 million to utilize hydrographic surveying contractors to collect data in critical coastal areas which are used to map the seafloor and update nautical charts.
The planet’s ocean surface temperature was the warmest on record for July, breaking the previous high mark established in 1998 according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. The combined average global land and ocean surface temperature for July 2009 ranked fifth-warmest since world-wide records began in 1880.
The 2009 class of nine NOAA's Fisheries Service/Sea Grant fellowships is the largest in the history of the program. Among the multi-year doctoral fellows, seven are studying population dynamics and two are studying marine resource economics.
NOAA’s Fisheries Serviceis proposing several measures to end overfishing and rebuild blacknose sharks and other shark populations. Nine public hearings will be held on the proposal, from New England to the Gulf of Mexico, in August and September.
NOAA is taking steps to respond to the New England red tide in the Gulf of Maine which has caused a near-complete shutdown of shellfish harvesting in Maine. Today the agency awarded $121,000 to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in partnership with the University of Maine to conduct research cruises to monitor the toxins. The information obtained will help managers determine how long the severe red tide conditions may last, if there are regions where the bloom is receding, and whether the bloom will expand to new areas.
NOAA’s National Weather Service is asking the marine community to help safeguard its offshore buoys — which provide meteorologists with critical data for weather and tsunami forecasts — following a series of incidents where buoys were damaged or cut from their moorings.
Scientists from NOAA’s Coral Reef Watch Program say conditions are favorable for significant coral bleaching and infectious coral disease outbreaks in the Caribbean, especially in the Lesser Antilles. The forecast is based on the July NOAA Coral Reef Watch outlook, which expects continued high water temperatures through October 2009.
NOAA will join a multi-agency joint expedition that will bring together icebreakers from the U.S. and Canada to collect and share data useful to both countries in defining the full extent of the Arctic continental shelf.
According to its August Atlantic hurricane season outlook, NOAA now expects a near- to below-normal Atlantic hurricane season, as the calming effects of El Niño continue to develop. But scientists say the season’s quiet start does not guarantee quiet times ahead. The season, which began June 1, is entering its historical peak period of August through October, when most storms form.
Saltwater recreational fishing continued to provide important economic benefits to America’s coastal communities in 2008, bringing fishermen to the shore to reel in fish, book spots on charter and party boats, buy bait and tackle, stay in local inns and eat at local restaurants, according to a report issued this week by NOAA’s Fisheries Service.
NOAA has selected the Port of Newport, Ore., to be the new home of the agency’s Marine Operations Center-Pacific beginning in 2011 pending the signing of a 20-year lease.
Commercial fishermen unloaded 612.7 million pounds of fish and shellfish at the port of Dutch Harbor-Unalaska, Alaska, in 2008, mostly pollock, making it the country’s top port for the amount of fish landed for the 20th consecutive year, NOAA’s Fisheries Service announced today.
NOAA will place ocean current monitoring sensors at two former military munitions disposal sites off Oahu this week as part of an ongoing effort to assess the potential impact of sea-disposed military munitions in Hawaii.
NOAA-supported scientists found the size of this year’s Gulf of Mexico dead zone to be smaller than forecasted, measuring 3,000 square miles. However the dead zone, which is usually limited to water just above the sea floor, was severe where it did occur, extending closer to the water surface than in most years.
NOAA has issued a Request for Proposals for construction of NOAA’s newest fisheries survey vessel, the fifth in its state-of-the-art Oscar Dyson vessels class designed for 40-day mission science deployments.
Emergency management and severe weather contact information for Florida’s Atlantic coast is now available in an easily read tip-sheet. Part of the popular NOAA Extreme Weather Information Sheet series, this one-page document contains critical phone numbers and Web site information residents can use during potentially life-threatening weather emergencies.
Scientists at NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) have successfully conducted the first remote detection of a harmful algal species and its toxin below the ocean’s surface. The achievement was recently reported in the June issue of Oceanography.
NOAA Corps Capt. William B. Kearse assumed command of the NOAA Aircraft Operations Center in Tampa, Fla. The center, located on MacDill Air Force Base, is home to most of NOAA’s 14 research aircraft, including the NOAA WP-3D Orion “hurricane hunter” aircraft and Gulfstream-IV hurricane surveillance jet.
More than 2,500 acres of coastal wetlands have been restored and enhanced in Port Arthur, Texas, as a result of a cooperative agreement between NOAA and its federal and state natural resource trustee partners.
The June 2009 temperature and precipitation for the contiguous United States were near the long-term average, based on records going back to 1895, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
NOAA and the University of California have signed a 55 year ground lease clearing the way for construction next year of a new federal laboratory and office center at the University of California, San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography campus in La Jolla.
While the overall crab population in the Chesapeake Bay rebounded significantly last year, the number of juvenile crabs remained well below the historical average, according to a report published by the NOAA-chaired Fisheries Steering Committee.
A hired master, vessel owners and permit holders of the Alaskan fishing vessel Trident have agreed to pay more than $18,000 in penalties and $241,000 worth of sanctions for falsely reporting areas fished by the vessel on five trips during 2006 and 2007.
The Commerce Department today announced the appointment of 30 new and returning members to the eight regional fishery management councils – important partners with NOAA’s Fisheries Service in determining how ocean fisheries are managed.
The 2009 Volvo Environmental Prize Foundation has named NOAA Senior Scientist Susan Solomon as the recipient of its 2009 environmental prize.
Some of the substances that are helping to avert the destruction of the ozone layer could increasingly contribute to climate warming, according to scientists from NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory and their colleagues in a new study published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
NOAA and partnering organizations are deploying scuba divers and state-of-the-art technology this week to study the current condition of the USS Monitor, a Civil War shipwreck protected by a NOAA national marine sanctuary.
NOAA’s Oceanic and Atmospheric Research and National Marine Fisheries Service, have selected a consortium of five universities for the new Cooperative Institute for North Atlantic Research (CINAR). The institutions will join NOAA to conduct ocean and climate research to better understand the correlation between climate change and variability, fishing practices and fish populations, and to develop an integrated capability to research emerging issues from an ecosystem perspective.
A team of NOAA-supported scientists from the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, Louisiana State University, and the University of Michigan is forecasting that the “dead zone” off the coast of Louisiana and Texas in the Gulf of Mexico this summer could be one of the largest on record. The dead zone is an area in the Gulf of Mexico where seasonal oxygen levels drop too low to support most life in bottom and near-bottom waters.
Our love of outdoor activities and the frequency of thunderstorms make summer the most likely time to be injured or killed by lightning, according to statistics compiled by NOAA’s National Weather Service. In order to reduce lightning injuries and fatalities, the National Weather Service is promoting Lightning Safety Awareness Week the last week of June.
NOAA Captain Michael S. Devany has taken command of the day-to-day operations of the nine research and survey ships in NOAA’s Atlantic fleet controlled from the agency’s Atlantic Marine Operations Center in Norfolk, Va.
A new NOAA report on the health of Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary indicates that the overall condition of the sanctuary’s marine life and habitats is fair to good, but identifies several emerging threats to sanctuary resources.
NOAA and NASA officials announced a new Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES), launched tonight, successfully reached orbit, joining three other GOES spacecraft that help NOAA forecasters track life-threatening weather and solar storms.
Add severe weather to the list of natural wonders Grand Teton National Park rangers are prepared to handle. On Thursday, June 18, NOAA’s National Weather Service will recognize Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming as the first StormReady® national park in the United States.
NOAA's Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today extended Endangered Species Act protection to more Atlantic salmon by adding fish in the Penobscot, Kennebec, and Androscoggin rivers and their tributaries to the endangered Gulf of Maine population first listed in 2000.
This month as beachgoers and coastal residents enjoy gentle sea breezes, a group of NOAA scientists and students from Jackson State University will take a deeper look at what happens when the wind blows.
Brigham Young University (BYU)-Idaho, located in Rexburg, has earned NOAA’s National Weather Service StormReady® designation that shows the university is better equipped to prepare and warn its students and faculty of severe weather.
NOAA’s Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary, headquartered in Savannah, Ga., will host 40 students from across the nation this month during the National Association of Black Scuba Divers’ (NABS) Youth Educational Summit. The program’s goal is to develop young leaders through marine science.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is holding a series of public meetings this summer seeking comments on potential changes in the way commercial and recreational fishermen fish the U.S. quotas for swordfish and bluefin tuna in the Atlantic.
NOAA today took delivery of Pisces, the third of four new fisheries survey vessels and a significant achievement in the agency’s efforts to modernize its fleet of fisheries, oceanographic, and hydrographic survey ships.
Climate change is already having visible impacts in the United States, and the choices we make now will determine the severity of its impacts in the future, according to a new and authoritative federal study assessing the current and anticipated domestic impacts of climate change.
NOAA, working with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, has selected Alcan Builders Inc. of Fairbanks, Alaska, to construct a new NOAA satellite operations facility in Fairbanks. The 20,000-square foot facility will replace the existing Command and Data Acquisition Station building, which opened in 1961.
Stakeholder support for management strategies and regulations of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary grew dramatically among key user groups over a 10-year period, according to a study conducted by researchers from NOAA, the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, and Thomas J. Murray and Associates. The increase in support is particularly significant among commercial fishermen, the majority of whom were against the creation of the sanctuary.
With summer vacation on the horizon, NOAA and the National Park Service are alerting beach-goers to the threat of rip currents and how to prevent drowning from their strong and potentially fatal grip.
NOAA's Fisheries Service scientists and their partners have launched an unmanned aircraft to mount the vehicle’s first search for ice seals at the southern edge of the Bering Sea pack ice during the Arctic spring, in an effort to learn more about these remotely located species.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has awarded a $364,000 grant to the World Wildlife Fund in support of the 2009 Smart Gear Competition, which awards prizes for innovative gear designs that reduce fisheries bycatch.
NOAA's Fisheries Service has released its recovery plan for sockeye salmon in Washington's Lake Ozette and its surrounding watershed aimed at making these federally protected fish naturally self-sustaining, with enough fish to spawn in the wild and return year after year so they are likely to persist for the next century and beyond.
NOAA is seeking public comment on a draft restoration plan for the Lower Duwamish River, located in Washington state, on behalf of the river’s natural resource trustees.
NOAA scientists have teamed up with experts from the University of Maryland and North Carolina State University to form the Cooperative Institute for Climate and Satellites. The new institute will use satellite observations to detect, monitor and forecast climate change, and its impact on the environment, including ecosystems.
NOAA released its final biological opinion today that finds the water pumping operations in California’s Central Valley by the federal Bureau of Reclamation jeopardize the continued existence of several threatened and endangered species under the jurisdiction of NOAA’s Fisheries Service.
The rerouting of the commercial shipping lanes off Boston set for June 1 is expected to reduce the risk of shipstrikes to endangered right whales by 58 percent and to all baleen whales by 81 percent, according to more than 20 years of whale sightings catalogued by NOAA and the U.S. Coast Guard.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service announced today that they will open public comment on a proposed framework to manage fishing in the Arctic waters of the United States in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking public comment on a proposed rule that generally prohibits acts that would kill or harm a distinct group of North American green sturgeon that spawn in the Sacramento River.
NOAA archaeologists will be in the Florida Keys this month training members of the National Association of Black Scuba Divers in underwater archaeology as part of a new education initiative to explore the maritime heritage of African-Americans and engage the community in marine resource conservation.
A new NOAA report on the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands (NWHI), protected by the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, provides the sharpest picture yet of the region’s marine life and ecosystems.
NOAA’s Central Pacific Hurricane Center today announced that projected climate conditions point to a near to below normal hurricane season in the Central Pacific Basin this year.
The Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced today that Harris Corporation – Government Communications Systems Division of Melbourne, Fla. has been selected to develop the GOES-R ground system, which will capture, process and distribute information from NOAA’s next generation geostationary satellite series to users around the world.
The City of Boston today received NOAA’s National Weather Service StormReady® recognition, indicating New England’s largest city is better prepared for the nor’easters and other severe storms that periodically batter the region.
A team of scientists funded by NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration and Research recorded the distinctive calls of endangered North Atlantic right whales in an area where it was believed that the historic resident population was hunted to extinction in the early 20th century. Besides providing a better understanding of the whales, the discovery has implications for future shipping in the region.
NOAA's National Weather Service and the National Safe Boating Council launched a new Web site to help boaters stay safe this spring and summer.
NOAA today selected 122 college students to receive scholarships as part of the Ernest F. Hollings Undergraduate Scholarship Program. The scholarships are geared to encourage undergraduates to pursue study in NOAA fields, such as atmospheric and oceanic science, research, and technology.
Scientists have documented the first known migration of blue whales from the coast of California to areas off British Columbia and the Gulf of Alaska since the end of commercial whaling in 1965.
A Washington state man has been fined $160,000 and sentenced to 30 days in jail for intentionally mislabeling 136,000 pounds of turbot from China as much higher priced U.S. halibut—one of the strongest sentences ever imposed for this type of violation, according to enforcement officials from NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement in Seattle.
The April 2009 temperature for the contiguous United States was below the long-term average, based on records going back to 1895, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, NC.
Although its peak is still four years away, a new active period of Earth-threatening solar storms will be the weakest since 1928, predicts an international panel of experts led by NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center and funded by NASA. Despite the prediction, Earth is still vulnerable to a severe solar storm.
Mariners can now get free real-time information on water and weather conditions for the Port of Lake Charles, La., from a new NOAA ocean observing system at the port.
A new United Nations report, with key contributions from NOAA, found that 61 of the world’s 64 large marine ecosystems — large coastal ocean waters adjacent to continents — show a significant increase in sea surface temperatures in the last 25 years, contributing to decreasing fisheries catches in some areas and increasing catches in others.
Many of Washington State’s sea otters are exposed to the same pathogens responsible for causing disease in marine mammal populations in other parts of the country, according to a study published by researchers from NOAA’s Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and their partners.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service reported to Congress today that four stocks — Atlantic bluefish, Gulf of Mexico king mackerel and two stocks of monkfish in the Atlantic — have been rebuilt to allow for continued sustainable fishing. This is the largest number of stocks to be declared rebuilt in a single year since the fisheries service declared the first stock successfully rebuilt in 2001.
The NOAA FY 2010 Budget "blue book" Web site, which offers detailed highlights of the agency's $4.5 billion budget request and helpful one-page fact sheets, is now available online from NOAA's Budget Office.
The combined average global land and ocean surface temperatures for April 2009 ranked fifth warmest since worldwide records began in 1880, according to NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
A new handbook published online today by NOAA’s Fisheries Service gives teachers, community groups, and the public a detailed roadmap of how to design and conduct oral history projects that celebrate the people, history and culture of our nation’s coastal and Great Lakes fishing communities.
A new array of moored buoys in the Indian Ocean will provide critical climate and ocean data to help scientists predict the dramatic variations between seasonal monsoon rains and droughts.
A new set of ocean observing data that enhances the ability to track probable paths of victims and drifting survivor craft should improve search and rescue efforts along the U.S. coast. The data comes from the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS®), part of a joint effort among NOAA, the Mid-Atlantic Coastal Ocean Observing Regional Association, the U.S. Coast Guard, and the Department of Homeland Security.
Three hurricane names in the Atlantic and one in the eastern North Pacific were retired from the official name rotation by the World Meteorological Organization’s hurricane committee because of the deaths and damage they caused in 2008.
The Monitor National Marine Sanctuary Advisory Council will hold a public meeting May 19, 2009, at the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum in Hatteras, N.C. The meeting will begin at 10:00 a.m. with a public comment period at 11:30 a.m. NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries manages the sanctuary.
NOAA and NASA officials announced Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co. has been selected to build two satellites for NOAA’s next generation geostationary satellite series, GOES-R. The new series, poised to begin launching in 2015, will double the clarity of today’s satellite imagery and provide more than 20 times the information.
Students of all ages will have an opportunity on May 1 and May 15 to take a virtual field trip in the marshes and bays of four estuaries as part of NOAA’s "EstuaryLive" webcast.
NOAA hurricane experts will visit five East Coast cities aboard a NOAA hurricane hunter aircraft to raise awareness about storm threats and the danger of being caught without a personal hurricane plan. The five-day tour begins May 4.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today proposed to list three populations of rockfish in Puget Sound and the Strait of Georgia for protection under the Endangered Species Act. A final decision on the three will be made a year from now.
In an effort to conserve critical natural and cultural marine resources, the U.S. Departments of Interior and Commerce are partnering with federal, state and territorial agencies to form a National System of Marine Protected Areas (MPA).
Two of the most important climate change gases increased last year, according to a preliminary analysis for NOAA’s annual greenhouse gas index, which tracks data from 60 sites around the world.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke said today he was extending the 2008 West Coast salmon disaster declaration for California and Oregon in response to expected poor salmon returns to the Sacramento River, which have led to management reducing commercial salmon fishing off southern Oregon and California to near zero. Locke also announced that he would release $53.1 million in disaster funds to aid fishing communities.
NOAA has selected California educator Taylor Parker to join scientists aboard the 224-foot research vessel, NOAA Ship Oscar Elton Sette, as part of its Teacher at Sea program to bridge science and education.
The combined global land and ocean surface average temperature for March 2009 was the 10th warmest since records began in 1880, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced an emergency rule to protect threatened sea turtles in the Gulf of Mexico.
Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke and Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar today announced that the two departments are revoking an eleventh-hour Bush administration rule that undermined Endangered Species Act (ESA) protections. Their decision requires federal agencies to once again consult with federal wildlife experts at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration – the two agencies that administer the ESA – before taking any action that may affect threatened or endangered species.
NOAA officials joined two U.S. senators, state, and local community leaders today at the grand opening of the Sanctuary Learning Center for the Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary.
NOAA is helping Americans peer beneath the surfaces of the five Great Lakes by providing Google Earth with data that now includes detailed three-dimensional mapping of Lakes Huron, Ontario, Erie, Superior and Michigan.
The Department of Commerce today issued a decision upholding New York State’s objection to the proposed construction and operation of a floating liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal and subsea pipeline that would be located in the New York waters of Long Island Sound.
The March 2009 temperature for the contiguous United States was near the long-term average, based on records going back to 1895, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. Heavy precipitation last month also pushed the Red River, along the Minnesota-North Dakota border, to record levels, triggering major floods.
NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco visited Jug Bay this Earth Day to celebrate its groundbreaking restoration. After a decade-long effort, nearly 80 percent of the vital habitat has been restored. Lubchenco applauded the public and private partnerships and research initiatives at Jug Bay that are helping scientists better understand climate change.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service Office for Law Enforcement will begin a formal review on April 26 to retain its accreditation with the International Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies.
Two of the most important climate change gases increased last year, according to a preliminary analysis for NOAA’s annual greenhouse gas index, which tracks data from 60 sites around the world.
Vice President Joe Biden today presided over a ceremonial swearing-in ceremony of Jane Lubchenco, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator, in recognition of the agency’s role in providing sound and open science as the foundation for environmental and economic strength.
Warming temperatures in the Red River of the North basin will begin melting ice and snowpack, setting the stage for a dangerous second crest in Fargo, N.D., and Moorhead, Minn., later this month, according to forecasters with NOAA’s National Weather Service.
NOAA today christened a new state-of-the-art research vessel, R/V Bay Hydro II, which will collect oceanographic data in the Chesapeake Bay region – data critical to safe navigation and environmental protection in the nation’s largest estuary. The dedication took place in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor, featuring a ceremonial breaking of a champagne bottle over the bow and a cannon salute from the USS Constellation.
collaborative nationwide project exploring the origins, structure and evolution of tornadoes will occur from May 10 through June 13 in the central United States. The project, Verification of Rotation in Tornadoes EXperiment2 (VORTEX2 or V2), is the largest and most ambitious attempt to study tornadoes in history and will involve more than 50 scientists and 40 research vehicles, including 10 mobile radars.
Marine life and habitats at Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument are in good overall condition, but face emerging threats, according to a new NOAA report on the monument’s health.
Summers in the Arctic may be ice-free in as few as 30 years, not at the end of the century as previously expected. The updated forecast is the result of a new analysis of computer models coupled with the most recent summer ice measurements.
Jane Lubchenco, Ph.D., was confirmed by the U.S. Senate this evening as the under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere. In this capacity, she will serve as the ninth administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the nation’s top science agency for climate, oceans, and the atmosphere. Dr. Lubchenco is the first woman and the first marine ecologist to lead NOAA.
New regulations for NOAA's four national marine sanctuaries in California are now in effect, providing greater protection for the sanctuaries' valuable marine resources and habitats.
The NOAA Ship Nancy Foster is returning to Puerto Rico this week to continue a multi-year effort to study coral reef ecosystems and fish habitat in the commonwealth’s near-shore waters.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced today it will allocate $16 million of its current fiscal year 2009 budget to assist the Northeast fishing industry with the transition to management of the fishery by sectors and catch shares. On Monday, NOAA announced the interim rules to reduce overfishing and rebuild Northeast Groundfish stocks.
A new report by NOAA’s Fisheries Service detailing the diverse demographics of 222 American saltwater fishing communities will help the agency design management strategies that will lead to more sustainable fisheries.
NOAA has submitted to Congress its proposed Recovery plan to create jobs, strengthen the economy, and restore our environment. Under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act , NOAA was provided $830 million.
Warming temperatures in the Red River of the North basin will begin melting ice and snowpack, setting the stage for a dangerous second crest in Fargo, N.D., and Moorhead, Minn., later this month, according to forecasters with NOAA’s National Weather Service.
NOAA today announced interim fishing measures that protect the Northeast groundfish stocks most in trouble, while still allowing the fishing industry to target some healthy stocks as the fishery rebuilds. The new rules, which take effect May 1, balance economic and conservation concerns, and are an important step toward ending overfishing by 2010 as required by the Magnuson-Stevens Act.
NOAA scientists, in a first-of-its-kind report issued today, state that Polybrominated Diphenyl Ethers (PBDEs), chemicals commonly used in commercial goods as flame retardants since the 1970s, are found in all United States coastal waters and the Great Lakes, with elevated levels near urban and industrial centers.
Federal and state officials in the coastal areas of northern California will conduct a test of the tsunami warning communications system between 10:15 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. on Wednesday, March 25.
NOAA and its emergency management partners will be conducting a statewide test of the tsunami warning communications system on Wednesday, March 25 at 9:45 a.m.
Jefferson County, Wash., has earned the NOAA National Weather Service TsunamiReady™ designation, better equipping emergency managers to prepare and warn its citizens about tsunamis.
NOAA has begun accepting proposals for coastal habitat restoration projects under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The effort will foster healthy and resilient American communities while generating and protecting jobs for the thousands of people whose task it will be to restore valuable coastal and marine habitat.
Residents and visitors along the Atlantic coasts of the United States and Canada, the Gulf of Mexico, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands should not be alarmed when they hear tsunami test messages broadcast over their televisions and radios on Thursday, April 2, 2009.
NOAA’s Monitor National Marine Sanctuary Advisory Council Seeks Participants for Youth Working Group
NOAA's Monitor National Marine Sanctuary is seeking people between 14 and 17 years of age to provide input to its advisory council and superintendent on ocean conservation issues and how this next generation views ocean issues.
Yakutat, Alaska, has earned the NOAA National Weather Service TsunamiReady and StormReady designations, better equipping the town to handle severe weather and tsunamis.
A guide is now available to help individuals of all ages understand how climate influences them -- and how they influence climate. A product of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, it was compiled by an interagency group led by NOAA.
NOAA's National Ocean Service launched a new educational online game ”WaterLife: Where Rivers Meet the Sea” today at the annual meeting of the National Science Teachers Association in New Orleans, La.
NOAA and the U.S. Air Force Reserve will host a series of public events the week of March 22 in five coastal communities in the Bahamas, Mexico and the Caribbean to urge residents to prepare for the upcoming hurricane season.
The combined global land and ocean surface average temperature for February 2009 was the ninth warmest since records began in 1880, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service said today it is proposing to list Pacific smelt as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. Final action on the proposal could come as soon as a year from now.
NOAA scientists measuring contaminants in the vicinity of the National Defense Reserve Fleet in Suisun Bay, Calif., during a year-long environmental study found metals, PCBs and other compounds at levels comparable to those at other locations throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Their findings are detailed in a new report.
NOAA will hold the first of five public hearings on Mon., Mar.16, in Boston, to receive comments on a proposed rule to identify and certify nations with vessels engaged in illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing or bycatch of protected species, such as marine mammals and sea turtles.
“Just stop feeding me!” says an animated dolphin in a new public service announcement released today that highlights the dangers of dolphins getting hooked on human handouts. The PSA was produced by a coalition of government agencies and private organizations.
The concept of delaying global warming by adding particles into the upper atmosphere to cool the climate could unintentionally reduce peak electricity generated by large solar power plants by as much as one-fifth, according to a new NOAA study. The findings appear in this week’s issue of Environmental Science and Technology.
NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, Mass. advises fishery managers with the best available science to set catch limits in the groundfish fishery, according to a recently released report by the Department of Commerce Office of the Inspector General.
NOAA’s National Weather Service has issued a report that analyzes forecasting performance and public response during the second deadliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history. The report, Service Assessment of the Super Tuesday Tornado Outbreak of February 5-6, 2008, also addresses a key area of concern: why some people take cover while others ride out severe weather.
NOAA's Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, NOAA Fisheries Service and their partners today accepted the fourth charter operator into a program created to help protect wild dolphins in the Keys. Sea Bear Aquatic Adventures officially joined the Dolphin SMART program after successfully meeting standards that promote responsible viewing of dolphins in the wild.
NOAA’s Monitor National Marine Sanctuary is seeking to fill one seat on its advisory council, which ensures public participation in sanctuary management and provides advice to the sanctuary superintendent.
NOAA's Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary advises San Francisco Bay Area boaters to steer clear of whales, which migrate through the San Francisco Bay Area in large numbers during the spring. Gray whales are at a particularly high risk of collisions with vessels, as they often travel near shore and may even wander into the bay itself.
The wreck of an early 20th century fishing vessel that represents technological changes in New England’s fishing industry has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The 105-foot long Joffre shipwreck rests within NOAA’s Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary.
NOAA's National Weather Service today recognized South Carolina as the fourth state to be StormReady®. Over the past seven years, each of the state's 46 counties has completed this rigorous program to strengthen the state’s ability to protect life and property during severe weather.
NOAA released the draft management plan for Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary for public review and comment today. The plan provides a framework for the sanctuary’s resource protection, education and outreach, and research programs.
Globally, commercial ships emit almost half as much particulate matter pollutants into the air as the total amount released by the world’s cars, according to a new study led by NOAA and the University of Colorado at Boulder. Ship pollutants affect both global climate and the health of people living along coastlines.
NOAA Corps Commander John T. Caskey Takes Command of the NOAA Oceanographic Research Ship Hi`ialakai
Cmdr. John T. Caskey of the NOAA Commissioned Officers Corps took command today of the NOAA Ship Hi`ialakai, a ship dedicated to coral reef ecosystem research. He is the fourth to command the 224-ft. NOAA vessel, which was commissioned in 2004. The change of command ceremony was held on Ford Island, home port to three NOAA ships in Hawaii.
The combined global land and ocean surface average temperature for January 2009 was the seventh warmest since records began in 1880, according to a preliminary analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
The quick decline of a tiny shrimp-like species, known scientifically as Diporeia, is related to the aggressive population growth of non-native quagga mussels in the Great Lakes, say NOAA scientists. As invasive mussel numbers increase, food sources for Diporeia and many aquatic species have steadily and unilaterally declined.
While the nation as a whole gained freshwater wetlands from 1998 to 2004, a new report by NOAA and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service documents a continuing loss of coastal wetlands in the eastern United States.
A team of scientists, speaking today at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, called for new awareness of the potential for antibiotic-resistant illnesses from the marine environment, and pointed to the marine realm as a source for possible cures of those threats.
NOAA and its partners cut entangling ropes on another endangered North Atlantic right whale off the southeast United States earlier today – this time off northern Georgia.
Several fire weather forecasters from NOAA's National Weather Service are on duty in Australia providing crucial weather information to forecasters in the Australian Bureau of Meteorology as they battle wildfires ravaging southeastern Australia.
Exposure to two environmental poisons—DDT and domoic acid--during brain development can increase the number of epileptic seizures and their intensity in a laboratory model for human epilepsy, according to a report by NOAA scientists.
NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries has launched a new online multimedia library offering public access to thousands of high-resolution, ocean-related photos and videos taken by NOAA scientists, educators, divers and archaeologists.
An investigation by NOAA’s Fisheries Service into the deaths last May of six sea lions trapped on two floating cages below Bonneville Dam found no evidence of human intervention, either intentional or accidental, in the closing of the cage doors.
NOAA is alerting residents in the Red River Valley, which separates North Dakota and Minnesota, of the potential for significant flooding in their communities this spring.
Explore NOAA during NOAA Heritage Week: Feb. 6-14 in Silver Spring, Md.
NOAA scientists have created a high-resolution digital elevation model, or DEM, of Santa Barbara, Calif., that simulates the effects of deadly tsunamis and coastal floods. The model enables scientists and emergency managers to develop life-saving plans to protect residents in Santa Barbara County and the nearby coastal communities of Ventura and Oxnard.
The NOAA Ship Ronald H. Brown has returned to its homeport of Charleston, S.C., after spending four months in the eastern Pacific, most recently servicing an array of buoys which provide data for climate studies.
Last year, NOAA satellites helped rescue 283 people throughout the U.S. and its surrounding waters. NOAA satellites detect and locate distress signals from emergency beacons and relay the information to first responders on the ground.
A new study funded by NOAA and the National Science Foundation reveals that a part of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, which separates Washington state from Canada’s British Columbia, is a potential 'hot spot' for toxic harmful algal blooms affecting the Washington and British Columbia coasts.
NOAA's Climate Prediction Center today issued the first La Niña advisory under its new El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Alert System. Forecasters expect La Niña to influence weather patterns across the United States during the remainder of the winter and into the early spring.
NOAA scientists will travel to the west African nation of Senegal this week to train government officials and university students to be marine resource observers on fishing boats. The observers will collect scientific information about the health of fish stocks and the amount of incidental bycatch of marine mammals and other protected species.
NOAA and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service have signed agreements with 23 companies to cooperatively assess the lower 17 miles of the Passaic River and develop and implement a restoration plan to restore damaged habitat.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has issued regulations and a letter of authorization to the U.S. Navy that includes measures to protect marine mammals while conducting Atlantic fleet active sonar training off the Atlantic coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. The regulations require the Navy to implement measures designed to protect and minimize effects to marine mammals.
A new NOAA polar-orbiting environmental satellite, set to launch next month, will support NOAA’s weather and ocean forecasts, including long-range climate predictions for El Niño and La Niña and support U.S. search and rescue operations. The new spacecraft – NOAA-N Prime – is scheduled to lift off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on Feb. 4, 2009 at 2:22 a.m. PST.
During the past three winters, ozone—normally linked to hot-weather and urban pollution—has soared to health-threatening levels near a remote natural gas field in northwestern Wyoming. Now, scientists at NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory have solved the problem of how ozone can form in cold weather at levels threatening to human health.
The U.S. Climate Change Science Program has issued its final assessment product presenting a summary of methods and strategies to characterize, analyze, and deal with uncertainty as it relates to climate change and its effects.
NOAA has released the final management plan, regulations, and final environmental impact statement for Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) announced today the availability of the final revised recovery plan for the Northwest Atlantic population of the loggerhead sea turtle (Caretta caretta). The species is listed globally as threatened under the U.S. Endangered Species Act.
Researchers at the National Marine Mammal Laboratory of NOAA’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center have marked another decline in northern fur seal pup births in the Pribilof Islands in the Bering Sea, where most of the world’s population of northern fur seals gather in the summer to rest and breed.
NOAA's Fisheries Service today issued final guidance on annual catch limits designed to help restore federally managed marine fish stocks and end overfishing.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking comment on a proposed rule that outlines guidelines and procedures for initiating or responding to requests for fishery disaster determinations.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today determined black abalone, an edible marine mollusk, should be listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act. The ruling takes effect on Feb. 13, and comes one year after the fisheries service proposed to list the species.
NOAA is proposing measures to govern Northeast groundfish fisheries beginning May 1, 2009, the start of the new fishing year. The measures strive to reduce overfishing, continue rebuilding of groundfish stocks, and provide more options for fishing businesses trying to mitigate the economic effects of the measures while the New England Fishery Management Council finalizes a major revision to the fishery management plan.
NOAA is proud to announce the Buffalo Bills as the first National Football League team to become a StormReady® Supporter. With this designation the Bills are better prepared for severe weather and to make fans and spectators at Ralph Wilson Stadium aware of such events.
NOAA today submitted the first ever report to Congress identifying nations – France, Italy, Libya, Panama, the People's Republic of China, and Tunisia – whose fishing vessels were engaged in illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing in 2007 or 2008.
NOAA has established eight separate marine protected areas encompassing a total of 529 square nautical miles in south Atlantic federal waters to shield deep-water fish species and their habitats from fishing.
Recreational saltwater anglers pumped more than $31 billion into the U.S. economy in 2006, with Florida, Texas, California, Louisiana, and North Carolina receiving the largest share according to a new study issued by NOAA's Fisheries Service.
Senior federal officials today dedicated a specially equipped twin-engine NOAA aircraft that will support ocean research and management along the West Coast. The NOAA Office of Marine and Aviation Operations is basing the plane and flight crew in Monterey, Calif., to meet the needs of NOAA programs and national marine sanctuaries.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has issued regulations and a letter of authorization to the U.S. Navy to impact marine mammals while conducting training exercises around the main Hawaiian Islands. The regulations require the Navy to implement measures designed to protect and minimize effects to marine mammals.
On the 15th anniversary of a million-gallon oil spill that damaged the coastline of Puerto Rico, NOAA and partner organizations are celebrating the purchase of 152 acres to expand a coastal reserve near one of the areas hardest hit by the spill.
The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and NOAA's Coral Reef Conservation Program announced today the funding of 15 grants totaling more than $2.2 million through the jointly managed Coral Reef Conservation Fund (Coral Fund). The grants will help prevent further negative impacts to coral reefs by educating local communities and improving management effectiveness.
A larger facility to focus on Great Lakes issues opened today following a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the new NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL) in Pittsfield Township, Mich.
NOAA, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the states of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware are seeking public comment on a restoration plan to repair and improve shoreline and habitats of the Delaware River damaged by a vessel oil spill in 2004.
U.S. commercial and recreational fishing generated more than $185 billion in sales and supported more than two million jobs in 2006, according to a new economic report released by NOAA's Fisheries Service.
Juliana P. Blackwell has been named the new director of NOAA’s Office of National Geodetic Survey where she will oversee NOAA's responsibilities for the nation's spatial reference system. She is the first woman to head the nation's oldest federal science agency which was established by President Thomas Jefferson in 1807 as the Survey of the Coast.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service and its rescue team partners attempted a disentanglement of a critically endangered North Atlantic right whale earlier today.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the state of Hawai‘i has released the completed management plan and associated environmental assessments for Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, the nation’s largest marine protected area.
NOAA today announced that ribbon seals are not in current danger of extinction or likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future, and should not be listed under the Endangered Species Act.
NOAA today proposed reducing the number of halibut that charter vessel anglers in southeast Alaska can keep, from two each day to one.
The Department of Commerce today upheld the California Coastal Commission's objection to a proposal to construct a 16-mile toll road connecting California state Route 241 to Interstate 5 in southern Orange and northern San Diego counties.
NOAA announced that scientists around the world now have access to valuable data from a new international satellite, the Jason-2/Ocean Surface Topography Mission. This information allows them to closely watch the rate of global sea-level rise and monitor changing ocean features around tropical cyclones.
Greenhouse gases play an important role in North American climate, but differences in regional ocean temperatures may hold a key to predicting future U.S. regional climate changes, according to a new NOAA-led scientific assessment. The assessment is one in a series of synthesis and assessment reports coordinated by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program.
NOAA scientists have created four high-resolution digital elevation models, or DEMs, of Oregon’s coastline that simulate deadly tsunamis and floods. These models will help emergency managers develop life-saving plans for communities in those locations.
San Francisco has completed NOAA's National Weather Service TsunamiReady™ recognition program, better equipping the city to prepare and warn its citizens for tsunamis. San Francisco is now the most populous city in the United States to achieve TsunamiReady™ recognition and joins more than 60 TsunamiReady™ communities throughout the country, including 14 in California.
The teachers and students of John T. Hoggard High School in Wilmington, N. C., are the first high school in the country to prepare an action plan and practice drills making them ready for a tornado or other severe weather. This preparation has earned them the designation as a NOAA National Weather Service StormReady® Supporter.
Central interior Alaskan residents, visitors, barge captains and railroad operators now have access to weather information anytime, thanks to a new NOAA Weather Radio All-Hazards transmitter recently installed on Toghotthele Hill in Nenana, the 1,000th of these transmitters installed by NOAA.
NOAA has charged two dive business owners in Pensacola, Fla., with illegally operating spearfishing charters without the appropriate permits in federal waters off the Florida panhandle.
NOAA and NASA officials announced today Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, of Denver, Colo., has been selected to build two spacecraft for NOAA’s next generation geostationary satellite series, GOES-R. There are two options, each providing for one additional satellite. Scheduled for launch in 2015, the new satellites will provide more data in greater detail which is essential to creating accurate weather forecasts.
Weather and climate forecasters, emergency managers and other users of NOAA satellite information will meet with top NOAA officials in Miami, Dec. 8-12, to learn more about new equipment and software that will be needed to retrieve data from the next generation of NOAA satellites.
NOAA's Fisheries Service announced today it is making an additional $70 million in disaster-relief aid available to West Coast salmon fishermen, completing a financial-assistance package announced in September, when the agency released $100 million in disaster assistance.
NOAA's Office of the General Counsel for Enforcement and Litigation has announced a settlement agreement with the Fishing Company of Alaska and the captains and the owner of the F/V Alaska Juris for fisheries violations occurring from 2002 through 2004.
A new study, which confirms significant ocean acidification across much of the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, reports strong natural variations in ocean chemistry in some parts of the Caribbean that could affect the way reefs respond to future ocean acidification. Such short-term variability has often been underappreciated and may prove an important consideration when predicting the long-term impacts of ocean acidification to coral reefs.
For her scientific achievements, including pioneering research that helped explain the cause of the ozone hole, and her leadership as co-chair of Working Group 1 for the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report, NOAA Senior Scientist Susan Solomon will receive the Grande Medaille from the Institute of France’s Academy of Sciences.
NOAA has released final revised management plans, regulations and a joint final environmental impact statement for Cordell Bank, Gulf of the Farallones and Monterey Bay national marine sanctuaries. The plans include the expansion of Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary by 775 square miles to include the Davidson Seamount, one of the largest known underwater mountains in U.S. coastal waters and home to a wide variety of marine species.
The NOAA research ship Albatross IV was decommissioned today, ending its distinguished 45-year career in service to the nation. The vessel sailed over 655,000 miles on 453 research cruises, primarily fisheries surveys off the northeastern coast of the United States. These surveys created the world’s longest continuous study of fish population data.
NOAA has released new scientific information showing a decline in the walleye pollock biomass that has the agency recommending a cut to the pollock catch for 2009 in the eastern Bering Sea.
NOAA will conduct five public meetings in December to gather comments from individuals, organizations and government agencies on key issues relating to the management of Monitor National Marine Sanctuary.
The U.S. departments of Interior and Commerce today jointly announced the availability of the final Framework for the National System of Marine Protected Areas of the United States, completing a cooperative, multi-year effort to provide a comprehensive approach to the protection of the nation’s natural and cultural marine treasures.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced that several Northwest Indian tribes and the state of Washington will be eligible for up to a total of $2 million to assist tribal and non-tribal communities affected by the commercial fishery failure in Fraser River sockeye salmon.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced the states of Massachusetts and Maine will each be eligible for up to $2 million and New Hampshire will be eligible for up to $1 million in disaster aid to assist the shellfishing industries affected by this year’s closures due to the harmful algal bloom, commonly known as a red tide.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced that the states of Maryland and Virginia will each be eligible for up to $10 million to assist watermen who have been economically hurt by the commercial fishery failure in the soft shell and peeler blue crab fishery in Chesapeake Bay.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced the state of Louisiana will be eligible for up to $40 million and Texas will be eligible for up to $7 million in disaster aid to restore and rebuild the states’ fish habitats and fishing industries devastated by hurricanes Gustav and Ike.
NOAA today issued a biological opinion to the Environmental Protection Agency that found three chemicals used in pesticides – diazonin, malathion, and chlorpyrifos - are likely to jeopardize 27 populations of salmon on the West Coast that are listed as either endangered or threatened. The opinion calls for buffer zones next to salmon streams where the chemicals are used.
Expanding the use of seasonal to interannual climate forecasts, especially in drought-prone and semi-arid parts of the United States, can assist decision makers in the management of water resources, according to a new NOAA-led scientific assessment. The assessment is one in a series of synthesis and assessment reports coordinated by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program.
A joint undercover operation by NOAA's Fisheries Service Office of Law Enforcement and New York and New Jersey enforcement agents has uncovered evidence of alleged illegal fishing by two charter operators. The operators, Steven N. Forsberg and Viking Starship Inc. of Montauk, N.Y., and Jerome E. Hurd of Avalon, N.J., have been charged by NOAA with taking their patrons to catch striped bass in federal waters, where capture of the prized sport fish is prohibited.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez today determined that the economic effects of closing some shellfish fisheries due to a harmful algal bloom, commonly referred to as a red tide, in ocean waters off Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Maine has caused a commercial fishery failure.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez today determined that there has been a commercial fishery failure due to a continued fisheries resource disaster in the sockeye salmon fisheries in Puget Sound and the northern Pacific coast of Washington.
Officials from NOAA and Environment Canada announce a partnership to share weather and climate data, using high-tech monitoring stations located in their respective countries. The effort will improve the accuracy of each country’s data and give scientists a clearer, more accurate picture about climate change in North America.
A new NOAA-led assessment of the global ozone layer says the U.S. has reduced by 97-98 percent the production of ozone damaging substances since the late 1980s. The assessment is one in a series of synthesis and assessment reports coordinated by the U.S. Climate Change Science Program.
A new NOAA report on the health of Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary indicates that the sanctuary’s marine life and habitats are in good overall condition but face emerging threats from potential oil spills, invasive species, commercial development, climate change and underwater noise pollution.
NOAA's Fisheries Service advises all mariners and fishermen to keep a sharp look out for North Atlantic right whales in southeast U.S. waters from Nov. 15 through April 15. Each year, pregnant female North Atlantic right whales migrate southward more than 1,000 miles from their feeding area off Canada and New England to the warm, calm coastal waters off South Carolina, Georgia, and northeastern Florida to give birth and nurse their young. These waters are the only known calving area for the species.
Venkatachalam Ramaswamy of Lawrenceville, N.J., has been named director of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton, N.J. GFDL develops prediction models, as well as conducts climate research. Ramaswamy is a NOAA scientist whose work has focused on natural and human influences on climate.
October 2008 temperature and precipitation were near the long-term average for the contiguous United States, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., based on records dating back to 1895.
The ozone hole over Antarctica, which fluctuates in response to temperature and sunlight, grew to the size of North America in a one-day maximum in September that was the fifth largest on record, since NOAA satellite records began in 1979.
NOAA is accepting applications for a scholarship program in honor of retired South Carolina Sen. Ernest F. Hollings who promoted oceanic and atmospheric research throughout his career. This is the fifth year this scholarship is being made available to students interested in pursuing degrees in ocean and atmospheric sciences and education.
Recognizing more than 37 years of dedication, NOAA's National Weather Service has named Pocatello, Idaho, resident Dick Clothier as a 2008 recipient of the agency’s Thomas Jefferson Award for outstanding service in the Cooperative Observer Program. The award is the agency’s most prestigious, and only six are presented this year to deserving cooperative weather observers from around the country.
NOAA's Fisheries Service will increase its protection of threatened elkhorn and staghorn corals in Florida, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands through a new rule to prohibit activities that result in death or harm to either species. The new regulations take effect on Nov. 21.
Check with NOAA's National Hurricane Center for the latest forecast for Paloma in the Caribbean.
NOAA's Fisheries Service today announced a monitoring plan for 12 bottlenose dolphins in the Shrewsbury and Navesink rivers. The agency also announced that there will be no effort to force the dolphins out of the area at this time.
NOAA has completed a detailed plan to modernize its marine operations by replacing nine research ships and refurbishing a 10th in the next 15 years.
Stephen Brueske, a meteorologist with 24 years of forecasting experience, begins his duties today as meteorologist in charge at NOAA's Milwaukee National Weather Service forecast office.
NOAA's Fisheries Service has made available the final recovery plan for white abalone, a marine mollusk listed in 2001 as endangered under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). This recovery plan outlines reasonable actions which are believed to be required to recover and/or protect white abalone, and is required by the ESA as a guideline for the conservation and survival of ESA listed species. The primary goal of this recovery plan is to establish self-sustaining populations of white abalone in a number of locations throughout its historic range.
The first comprehensive national study of how carbon dioxide emissions absorbed into the oceans may be altering fisheries, marine mammals, coral reefs, and other natural resources has been commissioned by NOAA and the National Science Foundation.
NOAA today announced that the Cook Inlet beluga whale population near Anchorage is in danger of extinction, and has been listed as an endangered species.
Temperature increases, a near-record loss of summer sea ice, and a melting of surface ice in Greenland are among some of the evidence of continued warming in the Arctic, according to an annual review of conditions in the Arctic issued today by NOAA and its university, agency, and international partners.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking comments through Nov. 13 on its proposed authorization for Navy training exercises off the coast of Southern California. The NOAA proposal includes protective measures designed to minimize effects on marine mammals.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking comments through Nov. 13 on its proposed authorization for the Navy’s Atlantic Fleet Active Sonar Training (AFAST) to take place along the Atlantic Coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. The NOAA proposal includes protective measures designed to minimize the effects of the training on marine mammals.
NOAA and the Student Conservation Association have signed an agreement that will pave the way for conservation interns to protect some of the most valued coastal natural resources, working with many of the nation’s premier marine scientists.
A NOAA-supported computer model using ocean temperatures developed at Oregon State University, is helping West Coast sport fishermen predict the best location for catching tuna.
Scientists equipped with new technology will conduct the first “saturation” mission to study the effect of ocean acidification on coral reef ecosystems. Ocean acidification describes the changing chemistry of water that occurs as excess carbon dioxide (CO2) is absorbed from the atmosphere. The 10-day mission begins today.
September 2008 was the 49th warmest and 38th wettest on record for the contiguous United States, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., based on records dating back to 1895.
NOAA's Coral Reef Watch bleaching monitoring network has expanded its network of "virtual stations" from 24 to 190 locations worldwide. These stations warn coral reef managers when there is an elevated risk of coral bleaching, based on temperature data from NOAA's environmental satellites.
The U.S. Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced $900,000 in NOAA Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) grants to five Pacific Northwest recipients.
The U.S. Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced $1.1 million in NOAA Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) grants to five New England recipients.
The U.S. Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced $1.3 million in NOAA Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) grants to five Gulf of Mexico recipients.
NOAA's National Geodetic Survey has recently incorporated 43 new GPS tracking sites into the Continuously Operating Reference Station (CORS) network, including 13 sites established by the Federal Aviation Administration as part of their Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS). Four of the new WAAS sites are located in Alaska, four in Canada, and five in Mexico.
Research funding totaling $3.85 million over five years has been awarded to the University of Oklahoma and Louisiana State University by NOAA's Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments Program. The funding will be used to assess the risks of climate and drought impacts in their regions, and to develop tools and resources for use by local and regional community managers in their long-range planning.
Central interior Alaskan residents, visitors, barge captains and railroad operators now have access to weather information anytime, thanks to a new NOAA Weather Radio All-Hazards transmitter recently installed on Toghotthele Hill in Nenana, the 1,000th of these transmitters installed by NOAA.
The federal government has organized a series of open houses to discuss the advisability of providing additional recognition or protection to the historic and scientific qualities of three specific marine areas in the Pacific. These public discussions were scheduled in response to President Bush’s memo to members of his Cabinet asking them to assess and recommend the appropriate future course in these three marine areas. The open houses are open to the press.
The Cook Inlet beluga whale population has held steady from last year’s count of 375 animals, based on NOAA’s Fisheries Service latest annual survey.
NOAA today launched the fourth of a series of new fisheries survey vessels designed to study fish quietly without altering their behavior.
Tropical Storm Marco moves into western Mexico.
The federal departments of Commerce and Education are forecasting a serious shortage of scientists trained to do the high-quality research required to rebuild fish stocks and restore marine species in the next decade.
Wind-forecast software from NOAA that improves the target accuracy of an aircraft drop system up to 70 percent and is now being used in both Iraq and Afghanistan has won a federal technology transfer award for four scientists at NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder.
NOAA Tracking Tropical Storm Laura in the western Atlantic.
The Sant Ocean Hall — opening September 27 at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History — combines 674 marine specimens and models, high-definition video experiences, one-of-a kind exhibits, and the newest technology, enabling visitors to explore the ocean’s past, present, and future as never before. The hall is the museum’s largest renovation since opening in 1910.
The NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office will deploy a “smart buoy” Sept. 26 in the Elizabeth River near downtown Norfolk to observe the river's changing conditions. The buoy, developed in partnership with the Nauticus museum, will be the southernmost buoy in NOAA's Chesapeake Bay Interpretive Buoy System (CBIBS), a network that provides mariners, scientists and educators with real-time data about the Bay.
Retired Navy Vice Admiral Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Jr., Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator, today announced his resignation, effective Oct. 31. Lautenbacher served as NOAA’s eighth Administrator for nearly seven years.
U.S. Commerce Secretary Carlos M. Gutierrez today determined that a decline in the harvest of soft shell and peeler blue crabs in Chesapeake Bay is a commercial fishery failure. The declaration is an important step in making watermen and their communities eligible for economic assistance.
EPA, NOAA and nine other federal agencies announced today the completion of an interagency report that guides the strategies of individual federal agencies and of the Interagency Marine Debris Coordinating Committee (IMDCC) to prevent and reduce marine debris. The report also discusses marine debris efforts, recent progress and innovative ways to reduce the problem in the future.
NOAA, an agency of the Commerce Department, has scheduled a public hearing on Sept. 22, 2008 in Del Mar, Calif. to receive public comments concerning a Coastal Zone Management Act (CZMA) consistency appeal filed by the Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency (TCA). The hearing will be held in O’Brien Hall at the Del Mar Fairgrounds, located at 2260 Jimmy Durante Boulevard, Del Mar, CA 92014. The hearing will begin at 10:30 a.m., and will continue until 8:30 p.m. PDT.
NOAA’s National Weather Service forecast offices in California will conduct the second annual California Hazardous Weather Awareness Week Sept. 22-27 to raise public awareness about the dangers of hazardous weather conditions in the state and provide information to help protect life and property.
A new NOAA report on the health of the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary indicates that the overall condition of the sanctuary’s marine life and habitats is “fair to good,” but identifies several emerging threats to sanctuary resources, such as potential oil spills, invasive species, commercial development, climate change, and underwater noise pollution.
Responders from NOAA are on the move as residents and businesses in Texas and Louisiana recover from the effects of Hurricane Ike.
NOAA’s National Weather Service will conduct a limited communications test of the tsunami warning system in the coastal areas of California, Oregon, and Washington on Wed., Sept. 24, between 10:15 a.m. and 10:30 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service announced today that it is making $100 million of disaster-relief aid available to West Coast salmon fishermen.
Eddie Bernard, director of NOAA’s Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle has become the first NOAA scientist to be awarded a Service to America Medal for his work in establishing an international tsunami detection and forecast system.
U.S. Commerce Secretary M. Carlos Gutierrez today announced a formal determination of a fishery resource disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, due to the devastation following Hurricanes Gustav and Ike.
NOAA's Chesapeake Bay Office will deploy a new edition of its series of “smart buoys” at the mouth of the Susquehanna River on Sat., Sept. 13, to monitor the bay's changing conditions.
This June-August 2008 summer season was the 22nd warmest on record for the contiguous United States, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. Also, last month ended as the 39th warmest August for the contiguous United States, based on records dating back to 1895.
The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science will make available more than 10 million hours of computing time for the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to explore advanced climate change models at three of DOE’s national laboratories as part of a three-year memorandum of understanding on collaborative climate research signed today by the two agencies.
As the U.S. coastal population continues to grow, so do the hazards when big storms approach. Now, an on-line tool, Historical Hurricane Tracks, helps users get a quick picture of coastal areas with the greatest frequency of hurricanes and tropical storms — and that historical “snapshot” can help community members and local emergency managers develop better plans for storm preparation and recovery.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking public comment on a proposal that identifies critical habitat for a distinct group of North American green sturgeon that spawn in California’s Sacramento River but migrate along the west coast of Mexico, the United States, and Canada.
Experts from the United States, Australia, Japan, Netherlands and the United Kingdom will gather at the University of Washington (UW) Tacoma Sept. 9-10 for the first-ever international workshop on the pervasive problem of microplastics in the marine environment. The workshop is sponsored by UW Tacoma and NOAA.
NOAA has announced the presentation of seven education grants totaling nearly $374,000 to Santa Barbara Channel area schools and non-profit groups. The grants, part of NOAA’s Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) program, will support environmental education projects focused on NOAA’s Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary.
NOAA has announced the presentation of 15 education grants totaling $799,000 to San Francisco area schools and non-profit groups. The grants, part of NOAA’s Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) program, will support environmental education projects focused on NOAA’s Gulf of the Farallones and Cordell Bank national marine sanctuaries, which are located off the north-central California coast.
NOAA has announced the award of 13 education grants totaling nearly $658,000 to Monterey Bay area schools and non-profit groups. The grants, part of NOAA’s Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) program, will support environmental education projects focused on NOAA’s Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, which is located off the central California coast.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today announced a proposal to redefine the endangered Gulf of Maine population of Atlantic salmon to include fish found in other nearby areas.
NOAA has selected nine scholars as national recipients of the Dr. Nancy Foster Scholarships as outstanding graduate-level scholars in the fields of marine biology, coastal resource management, and maritime archeology.
The Commerce Department has announced the re-appointment of Benigno M. Sablan, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, to the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council.
NOAA, an agency of the Commerce Department, has scheduled a public hearing for Sept. 22, 2008 in Del Mar, Calif. to receive public comments concerning a Coastal Zone Management Act consistency appeal filed by the Foothill/Eastern Transportation Corridor Agency (TCA).
NOAA's Fisheries Service chief science adviser Steven A. Murawski today presented the 2008 Dr. Nancy Foster Habitat Conservation Award to Peter Wellenberger, manager of the NOAA Great Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, for his three decades of commitment to stewardship, research and outreach concerning our nation's estuaries.
NOAA has launched a one-stop Southeast Marine Weather Internet portal offering marine weather forecasts and real-time coastal wind and water condition information for the Carolinas, Georgia, Florida and Alabama.
The combined average global land and ocean surface temperature for July 2008 tied with 2001 and 2003 as the fifth warmest July since worldwide records began in 1880, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
NOAA ship John N. Cobb, the oldest and only wooden hulled ship in the NOAA fleet, will be decommissioned today in Seattle after 58 years of service.
NOAA research chemist James Butler has been named director of the Earth System Research Laboratory (ESRL) division that monitors the Earth’s atmosphere.
A 29-day research expedition is underway in the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument through Aug. 28, 2008. Maritime archeologists from NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries will conduct survey work to identify and assess shipwreck sites for the purposes of management and preservation.
Scientists from NOAA’s Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary and partnering research institutions will embark on a nine-day research expedition Aug. 8 aboard the NOAA Ship Nancy Foster to monitor the health of coral reefs along almost 200 miles of the Florida Reef tract, the largest coral reef in the continental United States.
NOAA has selected nine scholars as national recipients of the Dr. Nancy Foster Scholarships as outstanding graduate-level scholars in the fields of marine biology, coastal resource management, and maritime archeology.
July 2008 was the 30th warmest July for the contiguous United States, based on records dating back to 1895, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. The average July temperature — 74.9 degrees F — was 0.7 degrees above the 20th century mean, based on preliminary data.
In a continuing effort to improve maritime safety and commerce in the northern Gulf of Mexico, NOAA has revised the Gulf of Mexico Marine Debris Project Web site, an outlet for hydrographic survey data identifying risks posed by debris left in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Submerged marine debris is a threat to viable commercial fishing and shrimping activities in the northern Gulf of Mexico coastal zone.
For more than 270 years, the Merrimack Village Dam in New Hampshire helped power saw mills, gristmills, a shoe factory and provided water for a chemical factory. No longer powering industry and scheduled for demolition, the dam has one last role to play — that of movie star. Beginning this week, NOAA, in partnership with the Conservation Law Foundation, will capture live on camera the removal of the dam, opening up 14 miles of the Souhegan River from Milford to Merrimack, N.H., providing extensive habitat for river herring, Atlantic salmon, American shad and American eel.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the National Science and Technology Council released an interagency report today that presents a plan for minimizing the impacts of freshwater harmful algal blooms in the United States.
NOAA is awarding $853,785 to support ocean observing efforts in Southern California. The fiscal year 2008 funding is provided through NOAA’s Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) program.
NOAA is awarding $750,000 to support marine observing efforts in the Great Lakes region. The fiscal year 2008 funding is provided through NOAA’s Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) program.
NOAA’s Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary is seeking to fill four seats and four alternate positions on its advisory council, which ensures public participation in sanctuary management and provides advice to the sanctuary superintendent.
NOAA’s Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary is seeking applicants for one primary position on the council’s conservation seat and one alternate position on its advisory council.
Aquaculture shows significant economic potential and good prospects for success in the United States, according to a new report commissioned by NOAA. The report’s authors call for clear rules to be enacted to guide the development of an offshore aquaculture industry.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service Office of Law Enforcement is offering up to $1,000 for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of persons poaching endangered sea turtles in the Territory of Guam and in the Commonwealth of Northern Marianas Islands.
Cements that bind individual coral skeletons and larger coral reef structures are predominantly absent in waters with naturally high levels of carbon dioxide, making these reefs highly susceptible to a wearing down of their physical framework, say scientists with NOAAs Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory in Miami, Fla. and other institutions.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service, in partnership with top international scientists and the U.S. Navy, has just completed a pioneering research effort in Hawaii to measure the biology and behavior of some of the most poorly understood whales on Earth. During the study, for the first time, scientists attached listening and movement sensors on marine mammals around realistic military operations.
NOAA-supported scientists from the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium found the size of this year’s Gulf of Mexico dead zone to be 7,988 square miles, slightly smaller than the predicted record size of 8,800 square miles and similar to the area measured in 2007. Scientists think Hurricane Dolly’s wind and waves may have added oxygen to the zone to reduce its size.
The Chesapeake Bay’s blue crab population remained below the long-term average in 2007, according to a report approved by the NOAA-chaired Fisheries Steering Committee.
NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries has extended the period for public comment on the draft management plan and draft environmental assessment for Gerry E. Studds Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary to Oct. 3, 2008. The original 90-day public comment period, during which eight public hearings were held throughout New England, was scheduled to end on Aug. 4, 2008.
The Arctic may get some temporary relief from global warming if the annual North American wildfire season intensifies, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Colorado and NOAA.
The NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office will deploy a "smart buoy" on Saturday at the mouth of the Rappahannock River to take observations of the Bay's changing conditions. A part of the Chesapeake Bay Interpretive Buoy System (CBIBS), this is the fourth interpretative buoy to mark the Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail.
Sally Ride, the first American woman in space, will join NOAA scientists in Silver Spring July 23-24 to teach K-12 educators how to integrate the science of earth’s changing climate into their classroom lesson plans.
Commercial fishermen unloaded 777.2 million pounds of fish, primarily Alaskan pollock, at the port of Dutch Harbor-Unalaska, Alaska, making it the country’s top port for landings in 2007, NOAA’s Fisheries Service announced today. The port of New Bedford, Mass., claimed the top spot for value of landings, primarily due to sea scallops, bringing in $268 million in 2007. The total domestic commercial landings for 2007 were 9.2 billion pounds, valued at $4.1 billion.
The average American ate 16.3 pounds of fish and shellfish in 2007, a one percent decline from the 2006 consumption figures of 16.5 pounds, according to a NOAA’s Fisheries Service study.
Marine recreational anglers caught more than 468 million fish in 2007, down slightly from last year’s historic high of 475 million fish, but still the second highest recreational catch total in the last ten years.
NOAA-supported scientists from the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium and Louisiana State University are forecasting that the “dead zone” off the coast of Louisiana and Texas in the Gulf of Mexico this summer could be the largest on record.
Latest updates on Atlantic Tropical Storm Bertha.
Instead of pulling into pit row for fuel, at least one team racing a solar-powered electric car in the 2,400-mile North American Solar Challenge will be relying on information provided by NOAA’s Surface Radiation Network for vital information about solar energy reaching the Earth’s surface — and their car’s solar cells.
NOAA's National Sea Grant College Program has designated Penn State University's Behrend College campus in Erie, Pa., as the Institutional Sea Grant Program for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Through this designation, Pennsylvania Sea Grant becomes the hub for marine and coastal sciences for the state and is responsible for long-term investments consistent with NOAA's national Sea Grant goals of environmental stewardship and responsible resource use.
NOAA’s National Weather Service Doppler radar covering Evansville, Ind., will be upgraded to make it compatible with the rest of the agency’s Doppler radar network.
Scientists from NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory in Miami will conduct an experiment through Sunday that temporarily will color the water red along coastal waters off southeast Florida to investigate the plume emerging from the South Central Regional Wastewater Treatment and Disposal Plant ocean outfall.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has issued guidelines and timetables for the three federal agencies involved in the management of 13 dams in northwestern Oregon’s Willamette River Basin that will allow the dams to be operated and maintained without threatening the continued existence of winter steelhead and chinook salmon, or harming their critical habitat.
Representatives from NOAA and the U.S.-Canadian Great Lakes Commission joined Michigan’s Lt. Gov. John Cherry today on the banks of Muskegon Lake to launch a new partnership to restore fish and wildlife habitat in the Great Lakes Region.
A new NOAA coral bleaching prediction system indicates that there will be some bleaching in the Caribbean later this year, but the event will probably not be severe. NOAA issued the first-ever seasonal coral bleaching outlook this week at the 11th International Coral Reef Symposium in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.
NOAA will assess the potential environmental impact of more than 70 federally owned obsolete and decommissioned vessels moored in Suisan Bay, Calif., during a series of field tests in July and August.
NOAA scientists reported in the current issue of the journal Environmental Health Perspectives that an algal toxin commonly inhaled in sea spray, attacks and damages DNA in the lungs of laboratory rats. The findings document how the body’s way of disposing the toxin inadvertently converts it to a molecule that damages DNA. Human inhalation of brevetoxins produced by the red tide organism, Karenia brevis, is an increasing public health concern.
Tugboats puff out more soot for the amount of fuel used than other commercial vessels, and large cargo ships emit more than twice as much soot as previously estimated, according to the first extensive study of commercial vessel soot emissions. Scientists from NOAA and the University of Colorado conducted the study and present their findings in the July 11 issue of the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
NOAA will lead a research expedition July 7-26 to study the wrecks of three German submarines sunk by U.S. forces in 1942 off the coast of North Carolina during the Battle of the Atlantic.
Nearly half of U.S. coral reef ecosystems are considered to be in "poor" or "fair" condition according to a new NOAA analysis of the health of coral reefs under U.S. jurisdiction.
Members of the Southeast Regional Marine Mammal Stranding Network successfully removed a black rubber strap Tuesday that was wrapped around the head of a juvenile bottlenose dolphin, averting a life-threatening injury.
Rodney McInnis, Southwest Administrator of NOAA’s Fisheries Service and U.S. Commissioner to the Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC), today expressed disappointment that a few countries blocked the Commission’s plan to conserve depleted tuna stocks.
With the arrival of hurricane season, NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) is prepared to respond quickly to hazardous material spill incidents resulting from severe storm events. OR&R scientists work with federal, state and local agencies to provide scientific support and assistance before, during and after hurricanes strike.
NOAA experts are continuing to evaluate a group of bottlenose dolphins feeding in New Jersey’s Shrewsbury River. The biggest threat to them at the moment is the behavior of humans eager to commune with them, rather than lack of food, disorientation, entrapment in the river, or their apparent health.
Today, NOAA christened a new, state-of-the-art research vessel that will enhance the study and protection of Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary in the Gulf of Mexico. The 83-foot R/V Manta will operate out of Galveston, Texas, where the sanctuary is headquartered.
Updates on Atlantic and Pacific storms.
NOAA announced today that seven stocks have been removed from the overfishing list and no new stocks added in their annual report to Congress on the status of fishing stocks.
The Department of CommerceThe Department of Commerce today issued decisions on two appeals of state objections involving the proposed construction and operation of liquefied natural gas terminals in Maryland and Massachusetts.
The Commerce Department today announced the appointment of 21 members to the eight regional fishery management councils.
Santa Barbara and Ventura County residents and visitors can now explore Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary without getting their feet wet through new state-of-the-art touch screen NOAA kiosks located at four sites along the coast.
Two NOAA scientists were selected by the Partnership for Public Service as finalists for the 2008 Service to America Medal. The scientists were selected for their life-saving and educational inventions.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking comments now through July 23 on its proposed authorization for Navy training exercises around the main Hawaiian Islands. The NOAA proposal includes protective measures designed to minimize impacts on marine mammals.
Mariners can now get free real-time information on water and wind conditions for the Port of Gulfport, Miss., from a new NOAA ocean observing system at the port.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today released a final environmental impact statement for the management of Alaska native subsistence hunting for beluga whales in Cook Inlet.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today announced a new rule to lower significantly the fishing quotas for sandbar and porbeagle sharks in order to rebuild these depleted species. NOAA also will implement new regional quotas for the other large coastal sharks.
NOAA’s Office of Education is providing funding to eight science education institutions for exhibits incorporating NOAA’s Science On a Sphere® or Magic Planet® and new Earth System Science information. These exhibits, composed of globe shaped screens that use computers and video projectors to display planetary data, give children and adults an exceptional view of our ever changing world.
With an active hurricane season forecast by NOAA's National Weather Service, planning and preparation is the message both to the general public as well as to key components within NOAA who respond with emergency services support following a storm's passage.
The combined average global land and ocean surface temperatures for spring (March-May) ranked seventh warmest, while May was the eighth warmest since worldwide records began in 1880 according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
NOAA and its local and national partners have successfully completed a $1.5 million multi-year project to restore a salt marsh and fish passage for migrating herring on Cape Cod.
NOAA is awarding $1,984,535 to support ocean observing efforts along the Southeast coast of the United States. The fiscal year 2008 funding is provided through NOAA’s Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) program.
NOAA announced today the competitive selection of collaborative research partners at the Cooperative Institute for Arctic Research (CIFAR) located in Fairbanks, Alaska, and the Cooperative Institute for Climate Science (CICS), in Princeton, N.J. The groups will join NOAA to conduct research in climate change, greenhouse gases, and changes to Arctic ice coverage.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is seeking comment on a proposed rule that requires anglers and spearfishers who fish recreationally in federal ocean waters to be registered before fishing in 2009.
NOAA’s National Marine Protected Areas Center, in cooperation with the Department of the Interior, has created a first ever online inventory of the nation’s marine protected areas (MPAs). This unique, comprehensive inventory catalogs and classifies marine protected areas within US waters, and was developed with extensive input from state and federal MPA programs, as well as other publically available data.
Scientists, reporting in the current issue of the online journal Marine Drugs, state that an increase of epileptic seizures and behavioral abnormalities in California sea lions can result from low-dose exposure to domoic acid as a fetus.
After a five year review, NOAA’s Fisheries Service has determined that the Caribbean monk seal, which has not been seen for more than 50 years, has gone extinct—the first type of seal to go extinct from human causes.
The numbers of northeastern offshore spotted and eastern spinner dolphins in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean are increasing after being severely depleted because of accidental death in the tuna purse-seine fishery between 1960 and 1990, according to biologists from NOAA’s Fisheries Service.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today outlined a plan to establish annual catch limits designed to help restore federally managed marine fish stocks.
This year may set records for tornadoes and tornado-related deaths. Only halfway through the season and there have already been 111 tornado-related deaths, making it the deadliest tornado season since 1998.
NOAA's Fisheries Service is proposing that East Coast trap/pot fishermen get six additional months to switch from floating to sinking groundline, a conversion that will help reduce the risk of entangling large whales in fishing gear.
NOAA is urging beachgoers to learn how to “Break the Grip” of rip currents before getting into the water. Rip currents are a deadly threat — accounting for more than 80 percent of lifeguard beach rescues.
NOAA has announced plans to invest $1 million over three years to help restore Alabama’s Mobile Bay, partnering with local organizations and citizens to reverse the loss of wetlands caused by coastal development.
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center projects a near normal or above normal hurricane season in the Atlantic Basin this year, which starts June 1. Preparation and planning are key to storm survival and recovery.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) are seeking public input on the draft revised recovery plan for the northwest Atlantic population of the Loggerhead Sea Turtle (Caretta caretta). The species is listed globally as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
NOAA Senior Scientist Susan Solomon, whose pioneering research has helped explain the cause of the ozone hole and for her leadership as co-chair of Working Group 1 for the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change assessment report, has been elected as a Foreign Member of The Royal Society of the United Kingdom.
Just in time for the 2008 Indianapolis 500, officials from NOAA's Indianapolis National Weather Service office and Indianapolis Motor Speedway have improved awareness, planning and communications for protecting race fans from severe weather.
NOAA’s Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary will co-sponsor a workshop with the Marin County Open Space District on June 11 to present recommendations for the restoration and management of Bolinas Lagoon.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service today approved fishing year 2008 management measures for summer flounder, scup and black sea bass recreational fisheries operating in the Atlantic waters from North Carolina to Maine to ensure overfishing does not occur.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service issued a new rule today that states starting June 1, charter vessel anglers in southeast Alaska will be allowed to keep one instead of two halibut per day.
Evidence of corrosive water caused by the ocean’s absorption of carbon dioxide (CO2) was found less than 20 miles off the west coast of North America during a field study from Canada to Mexico last summer. This was the first time “acidified” ocean water has been found on the continental shelf of western North America.
NOAA's Climate Prediction Center today announced that projected climate conditions point to a below-normal hurricane season in the eastern Pacific this year.
The number of humpback whales in the North Pacific Ocean has increased since international and federal protections were enacted in the 1960s and 70s, according to a new report funded primarily by NOAA and conducted by more than 400 whale researchers throughout the Pacific region.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service issued a proposed rule in the Federal Register to prohibit the future harvesting of krill between three and 200 miles of the coasts of California, Oregon, and Washington. Krill are a small shrimp-like crustacean and a key source of nutrition in the marine food web.
The NPOESS Integrated Program Office has selected the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory to develop the microwave imager/sounder sensor planned for the next generation of polar-orbiting weather satellites. The sensor will bring improved data and imagery, paving the way for better weather forecasts, severe-weather monitoring and climate change assessment.
A new satellite set to launch next month will monitor the rate of sea-level rise and help measure the strength of hurricanes, according to a leading NOAA scientist. At a press briefing today, Laury Miller, chief of NOAA's Laboratory for Satellite Altimetry, said NOAA will use data from the Jason-2/Ocean Surface Topography Mission (OSTM) to extend a 15-year record from two earlier altimeter missions that currently show sea level is rising at a rate of 3.2 mm/year — nearly twice as fast as the previous 100 years. “This rate, if it continues unchanged over the coming decades, will have a large impact on coastal regions, in terms of erosion and flooding,” said Miller.
NOAA's Fisheries Service announced today that it will honor seven people and two organizations for their efforts to enhance the understanding, protection, and sustainable use of U.S. ocean resources. This recognition is part of the agency’s third annual Sustainable Fisheries Leadership Awards program. NOAA’s leaders will present the awards at a ceremony in Washington, D.C., on June 2.
NOAA’s Central Pacific Hurricane Center in Honolulu expects three to four tropical cyclones in the central Pacific basin in 2008, a slightly below average season.
Mariners can now get free real-time information on water and wind conditions for the Port of Pascagoula, Miss., from a new NOAA ocean observing system at the port.
The natural resources of the Monitor National Marine Sanctuary off the North Carolina coast are in good condition overall, but the wreck of the Civil War ironclad encompassed by the site is at risk from human activity and natural deterioration, according to a new NOAA report.
The names Dean, Felix, and Noel, three of the most devastating storms of the 2007 Atlantic hurricane season, were retired by members of the 30th Session of the World Meteorological Organization's Regional Association IV Hurricane Committee during its annual meeting in Orlando, Fla.
NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries announced today it is offering “Ocean Guardian” grants of up to $6,000 to a number of California schools whose students create a school or community-based conservation project that protects their local watershed and the ocean.
U.S. Navy mine-hunting technology has a potential dual use to help NOAA find historic shipwrecks by allowing maritime archaeologists to “see” below the seafloor. With greater resolutions and access to deeper depths, maritime archaeologists can better understand submerged cultural and historic resources without disturbing those sites.
NOAA has awarded scholarships to 111 students from 36 states through the agency’s 2008 Ernest F. Hollings Undergraduate Scholarship program.
NOAA today released a comprehensive draft management plan and environmental assessment for Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary for public review and comment. Based on several years of scientific study and extensive public input, the plan recommends specific actions to address issues impacting the sanctuary.
NOAA's Fisheries Service, the federal agency charged with protecting Northwest salmon listed under the Endangered Species Act, released today a trio of biological opinions that provide comprehensive, far-reaching plans for the protected salmon species.
A sensor considered critical in monitoring global climate will be restored to the first satellite scheduled to fly in the National Polar-Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) top officials from NOAA, NASA, and the Air Force said yesterday.
While the Arctic and the Antarctic experience similar greenhouse gas levels and solar radiation, each region responds in a dramatically different way, especially in temperature and loss of sea ice, says an international team of scientists that includes a NOAA oceanographer. While the Arctic is warming, most of Antarctica is not, largely because of the ozone hole, but projections indicate that is likely to change.
Secretary of Commerce Carlos M. Gutierrez today declared a commercial fishery failure for the West Coast salmon fishery due to historically low salmon returns. Also today, NOAA’s Fisheries Service issued regulations to close or severely limit recreational and commercial salmon fishing in the area.
NOAA has launched a major initiative to link together a wealth of ocean observation data from a wide variety of federal and non-federal sources.
Remarks by VADM Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Jr., US Navy (Ret.) to the Maryland Space Business Roundtable; April 29, 2008.
Arlington County, Va., has become the fifth Washington, D.C., metropolitan county to become StormReady, making more than 63 percent of metro Washington D.C. StormReady.
NOAA today announced it will install the last nine of the 114 stations as part of its new, high-tech climate monitoring network. The stations track national average changes in temperature and precipitation trends. The U.S. Climate Reference Network (CRN) is on schedule to activate these final stations by the end of the summer.
Last year alone global levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, the primary driver of global climate change, increased by 0.6 percent, or 19 billion tons. Additionally methane rose by 27 million tons after nearly a decade with little or no increase.
In the spirit of Earth Day, Hawai‘i Governor Linda Lingle, Deputy Secretary of the Interior Lynn Scarlett, and retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., undersecretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator, gathered at Washington Place today to announce the availability of the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument Draft Management Plan and associated Environmental Assessment for public review and comment.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service will extend the final decision on listing Cook Inlet beluga whales up to six months, which will give NOAA researchers time to prepare a 2008 population abundance estimate before the agency decides whether or not to list the population under the Endangered Species Act.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has outlined new measures to prevent overfishing and rebuild the number of sandbar and other shark species. The public may comment on the final environmental impact statement (FEIS) until May 19.
NOAA and partners have launched a comprehensive, user-friendly online resource featuring the latest scientific research conducted within three West Coast national marine sanctuaries.
The Web site, http://sanctuarysimon.org, integrates scientific monitoring data from Gulf of the Farallones, Cordell Bank and Monterey Bay national marine sanctuaries — three contiguous, federally protected marine areas off California's northern central coast.
Coral experts from the Caribbean, Central and South America, and Florida will gather at a NOAA-hosted workshop this month to share strategies for mitigating and managing the impacts of coral bleaching and climate change on reefs in the Caribbean and other regions.
Herring in Lynn Canal, near Juneau, Alaska, should not be listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act since they are similar to other herring populations in the area that are being considered for listing, according to NOAA’s Fisheries Service.
A tour of the NOAA National Hurricane Center is now as close as your computer with the inauguration of a new virtual online tour of the famous forecast center. The Web site, http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/nhctour.shtml, provides panoramic views of different areas of the facility, accompanied by audio and text descriptions.
NOAA announced today that it will invest $200,000 in Florida’s Miami-Dade County to expand the scope of Baynanza, an annual celebration and cleanup of Biscayne Bay. The funding — the largest NOAA contribution ever made towards a community marine debris cleanup project — will support the large-scale removal of marine debris, such as abandoned vessels, docks and pilings, and other large items that cannot be bagged by volunteers.
NOAA scientists are now flying through springtime Arctic pollution to find out why the region is warming — and summertime sea ice is melting — faster than predicted. Some 35 NOAA researchers are gathering with government and university colleagues in Fairbanks, Alaska, to conduct the study through April 23.
The fragile and unique marine ecosystems of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands encompassed by the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument will receive additional protection under a new internationally recognized designation announced today by NOAA.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has determined that a petition to reclassify loggerhead turtles in the western North Atlantic Ocean as a distinct population segment with endangered status may be warranted, and is seeking comments on the petition action. Currently, loggerhead turtles are listed as a threatened species throughout the world.
A team of NOAA scientists traveled to Ghana this week to teach 40 government officials and university students to become trained marine resource observers, able to provide scientific data needed to manage their fish stocks.
NOAA's National Ocean Service is launching today a new multimedia elementary educational program, Nautical Charts, at the annual meeting of the National Science Teachers Association in Boston.
A field study now under way is looking at the pollutants within the Arctic atmosphere – called “Arctic Haze” – including their sources, concentrations, and climate impact, in an ice-free region.
A 90-ft. ship that helped bring closure to a grieving nation after two aircraft tragedies — the loss of TWA flight 800 in July 1996 and John F. Kennedy Jr.’s aircraft in July 1999 — will be decommissioned Mar. 25 after 41 years of service.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has accepted a petition from a California environmental group seeking protection under the Endangered Species Act for an ice seal called the “ribbon seal” that inhabits Alaska’s Bering Sea.
The Department of Commerce, in consultation with the Department of the Interior, has appointed 13 new members to the Marine Protected Areas Federal Advisory Committee. The agency has also reappointed one member to a new two-year term.
Secretary of Interior Dirk Kempthorne has announced that the crown jewel of NOAA's National Marine Sanctuary System, Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, is one of two sites he is considering to officially nominate for inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
The public is invited to provide input on the creation of a special research area in NOAA’s Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary during a comment period open through April 21. If established, the research area would dedicate a portion of the sanctuary’s waters to scientific investigation and exploration.
The average temperature across both the contiguous U.S. and the globe during climatological winter (December 2007-February 2008) was the coolest since 2001, according to scientists at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. In terms of winter precipitation, Pacific storms, bringing heavy precipitation to large parts of the West, produced high snowpack that will provide welcome runoff this spring.
NOAA’s National Weather Service, in collaboration with the California Office of Emergency Services and the Humboldt County Sheriff’s office, will conduct a test of the tsunami warning system in coastal Humboldt County, Calif., between 10:15 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. Pacific Daylight Time on Wed., Mar. 26.
A NOAA survey of land use along U.S. coasts shows that 53 percent of the new development between 1996 and 2001 occurred along the Southeastern U.S. coast between Texas and North Carolina.
NOAA's Fisheries Service is formally accepting a petition from the Cowlitz Indian Tribe to list eulachon (smelt) populations in Washington, Oregon and California for protection under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The tribe’s petition describes severe declines in smelt runs along the entire Pacific Coast, with possible local extinctions in California and Oregon
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is assembling a team of biologists to examine the decline of five Rockfish specifies in the Puget Sound and determine if it should formally propose listings under the Endangered Species Act. The assessment follows the acceptance of a petition filed by a Washington citizen.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service found that the State of New Jersey has failed to implement measures necessary to fulfill its responsibilities under the tautog interstate fishery management plan which are crucial for conservation of the salt water fish. As a result, NOAA will close New Jersey’s commercial and recreational fishery for tautog on April 1.
NOAA’s Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary has awarded the Farallones Young Marine Scientist Award to seventh-grade student Noe Manley for her entry which compared a fish’s size to its breathing rate in the 26th annual San Francisco Middle School Science Fair.
NOAA and the U.S. Air Force Reserve will host a series of public events the week of March 23rd in five coastal communities in Mexico and the Caribbean to urge residents to prepare for the upcoming hurricane season.
NOAA’s Office of National Marine Sanctuaries and the U.S. Army Dive Company are joining forces this month to repair buoy moorings, remove trash from dive sites, and install listening devices to track fish in national marine sanctuaries off Florida and Georgia.
American eels are fast disappearing from restaurant menus as stocks have declined sharply across the North Atlantic. While the reasons for the eel decline remain as mysterious as its long migrations, a recent study by a NOAA scientist and colleagues in Japan and the United Kingdom says shifts in ocean-atmosphere conditions may be a primary factor in declining reproduction and survival rates.
Scientists aboard the NOAA research vessel Oscar Dyson in the North Pacific have sighted a creature of great rarity and even myth: a white whale.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service has published its new Steller Sea Lion Recovery Plan to help restore the endangered population in western Alaska and provide further improvements to the threatened population across eastern Alaska.
NOAA scientists are reviewing unusual environmental conditions in the Pacific Ocean as the likely culprit for the dramatically low returns of Chinook and coho salmon to rivers and streams along the West Coast of the United States last year.
For the first time, America’s entire fleet of aircraft that fly through hurricanes now have instruments that measure surface winds, giving forecasters at NOAA’s National Hurricane Center a better view of the intensity and the size of these powerful storm systems.
Scientists at the National Coral Reef Institute are currently growing more than 400 corals from the larval stage as part of NOAA-funded research, and will transplant them to restore damaged coral reefs. "NOAA strongly supports research that will help managers develop new tools to address coral restoration," said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. "In this Year of the Reef, such innovative approaches may provide a new way forward to protecting these valuable resources."
NOAA and the World Bank today announced that they have signed an agreement to work together to help developing nations manage water resources, combat drought, and measure changes in climate.
NOAA's National Marine Sanctuary Program will use innovative Internet and satellite technology to transport students across the country to a scientific expedition in Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. The experience, which will feature the use of broadcasts from autonomous underwater vehicles, will be accessible on the Internet and telecast to a network of partner Boys and Girls Clubs across the nation via satellite from Mar. 2–7.
NOAA’s Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary is now recruiting volunteers for its Beach Watch shoreline monitoring program, which played a key role in the response to the 2007 Cosco Busan oil spill. Orientations and training will be held beginning this spring at several San Francisco Bay Area locations.
More than 700 volunteers gathered data from the shores of Oahu, Kauai, the Big Island, and Kahoolawe for Saturday’s annual Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary Ocean Count.
NOAA’s Milford Laboratory and the newly formed East Coast Shellfish Growers Research Institute have teamed up to study how growing and harvesting shellfish will affect the marine ecosystem. The partnership reaffirms the Bush Administration's support for a robust and healthy aquaculture industry, a focal point of President Bush's Ocean Action Plan.
A team of scientists have found that the economic damages from hurricanes have increased in the U.S. over time due to greater population, infrastructure, and wealth on the U.S. coastlines, and not to any spike in the number or intensity of hurricanes.
This month more than 30 scientists will embark on a research cruise to the Southern Ocean, which surrounds Antarctica, where they will be battling nature’s elements to study how gases important to climate change move between the atmosphere and the ocean under high winds and seas.
NOAA has selected the recipients of the 2008 Walter B. Jones Awards and NOAA Awards for Excellence in Coastal and Ocean Management. These biennial awards recognize coastal stewards, graduate students, state and local government, and non-governmental organizations for their outstanding efforts in coastal and ocean management.
A team of scientists studying the California Current – a slow-moving mass of cold water that travels south along the coast from British Columbia to Baja California – are seeing increasing areas of water off Washington and Oregon with little or no oxygen, possibly resulting in the deaths of marine animals that cannot leave the low-oxygen areas.
The average temperature across the contiguous U.S. during January 2008 was near average (ranking the 49th coolest) and the 31st warmest on record globally, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. Temperatures throughout most of the western U.S. were cooler than average and warmer than normal in the Northeast.
NOAA and the Shell Oil Company have signed a cooperative agreement to place meteorological and oceanographic observation sensors on seven Shell oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico. Once installed, the suite of observation equipment will become a vital component of the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS), providing valuable data for use in hurricane research, forecasting, and coastal resource management.
The California Resources Agency and NOAA National Marine Sanctuary Program have been honored for their joint “Thank You Ocean” campaign, which encourages Californians to learn about and respect the ocean.
Ben Kyger has been selected to manage the day-to-day operations of the nation’s weather and climate supercomputers that give federal, private and broadcast meteorologists the latest forecasts and models for national weather, daily air quality, U.S. hazards assessments, drought, hurricane, and seasonal outlooks.
In an effort to improve forecasts released 12 and 72 hours before a winter storm, NOAA is flying its WP-3D “hurricane hunter” aircraft into severe weather over the Pacific Ocean from a temporary base in Portland, Ore. The aircraft is acquiring atmospheric data from severe winter storms originating over the Pacific Ocean that will affect the continental United States.
James W. Balsiger has been appointed as acting assistant administrator for NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service, directing federal scientists and regulators responsible for managing commercial and recreational ocean fishing and the protection of marine mammals, sea turtles and their habitat.
Elkhorn and staghorn corals, listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in May 2006, will benefit from the designation of newly proposed critical habitat. NOAA is seeking public comment on its proposal, which identifies approximately 4,931 square miles of marine habitat in Florida, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands as critical habitat for the threatened corals – a requirement of the ESA.
NOAA's Fisheries Service will list Oregon coast coho as a threatened species under the federal Endangered Species Act.
Residents and visitors in southeast central Idaho now have immediate access to weather information thanks to a new NOAA Weather Radio-All Hazards transmitter, recently installed at Mt. Baldy near Salmon, Idaho.
NOAA’s Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary advises beachgoers against interacting with any seal pups they may find on the beach. Newborn harbor seal pups, born in late winter and spring, could suffer permanent harm if someone not licensed in marine mammal rescue were to move them.
NOAA has named Robert Maxson director of the Aviation Weather Center in Kansas City, the nation’s primary source of weather information for domestic and international flights. Maxson will leave his post as a research pilot with the National Science Foundation in Boulder, Colo. and begin his new duties at NOAA on Feb. 4.
More than 600 volunteers gathered data from the shores of Oahu, Kauai, the Big Island, and Kahoolawe for Saturday’s annual Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary Ocean Count on Jan. 26.
NOAA’s Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary has extended the deadline to Feb. 10 for applications for the tourism alternate and Chumash Community member and alternate positions on its advisory council.
David Westerholm, former chief of the U.S. Coast Guard’s Office of Response, has been named the new director of NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration.
NOAA’s top official today expressed concern that a contractor’s slow development of a critical new sensor will delay its delivery for a scheduled launch of a precursor mission for the National Polar-Orbiting Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS).
A warming global ocean — influencing the winds that shear off the tops of developing storms — could mean fewer Atlantic hurricanes striking the United States according to new findings by NOAA climate scientists.
NOAA has awarded a regional consortium of Great Lakes area universities and research organizations $760,000 for the first year of a five-year, $3.8 million pilot project to develop a new approach to analyzing and managing the cumulative effects of climate change, land use, invasive species, and other environmental stressors on Saginaw Bay and its surrounding ecosystem.
A former Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary research ship sunk last year off the Georgia coast as an artificial reef is now home to a diverse array of marine fish and invertebrates after only four months on the bottom, according to NOAA scientists.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service is asking for public comment as it considers four alternatives to deter California sea lions from eating imperiled salmon and steelhead that congregate below the Bonneville Dam on the lower Columbia River as they head upriver to spawn.
An international research team, including biologists from NOAA’s Fisheries Service, reported in the scientific journal Conservation Biology, that the estimated population of vaquita, a porpoise found in the Gulf of California, is likely two years away from reaching such low levels that their rate to extinction will increase and possibly be irreversible.
New coral reef maps released by NOAA reveal that the Big Island of Hawaii has the highest percentage of live coral of the main Hawaiian islands.
Fishing fleets from more than 30 countries on the high seas of the Atlantic and Pacific will now use new ways to avoid accidentally snaring seabirds going after bait on long lines.
NOAA's Office of Education is now accepting applications for environmental literacy projects to promote changes in K-12 education in effort to expand the amount of Earth system science taught in the classroom and improve student learning of the subject.
NOAA’s Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary and its partners today accepted the third charter operator into a new program created to help protect wild dolphins in the Keys. Key West Eco Tours officially joined the Dolphin SMART program after successfully meeting standards that promote responsible viewing of dolphins in the wild.
NOAA’s Fisheries Service announced today that the Atlantic white marlin, a billfish highly prized by recreational anglers, does not warrant listing as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. Based on the biological status of the species and consideration of the ESA listing factors, the species is not in danger of extinction.
The U.S. Climate Change Science Program Revised Research Plan Summary is available in the Federal Register and online for review and comment by the public.
After negotiations with the chairman of the International Whaling Commission, Japan has agreed not to target humpback whales during its annual whale hunt that is underway in the seas off Antarctica.
New NOAA fisheries survey vessel, launched on Dec. 19, in Mississippi, will be able to study fish quietly without altering their behavior.
NOAA and NASA today announced Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company of Palo Alto, Calif., has been selected for a $96.7 million (including options) contract award to design and develop a new instrument on the next generation of weather satellites.
NOAA Fisheries Service biologists estimate a beluga whale population of 375 in the Cook Inlet near Anchorage, Alaska, according to data collected during their annual survey in June. This population estimate is the largest since 2001.
NOAA is proposing to extend most of the prohibitions of the Endangered Species Act - normally applied only to endangered species - to the threatened elkhorn and staghorn corals.
Officials have broken ground for a new, larger NOAA Great Lakes research laboratory in Pittsfield Township, replacing the current Ann Arbor laboratory in mid to late 2008. The new building will provide twice as much space as the current location as well as updated wet and dry laboratories, and new conference capabilities including a lecture hall that can seat 150.
NOAA Coral Reef Watch coordinator Mark Eakin, and 17 fellow coral scientists from around the globe say corals could begin to disappear in 50 to 75 years due to steadily warming temperatures and increasing ocean acidification caused by carbon dioxide emissions.
NOAA has established a new monitoring program in Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary to collect data on the location and types of marine debris in the sanctuary.
NOAA Captain Michele G. Bullock recently took command of the day-to-day operations of the 10 research and survey ships in NOAA’s Pacific fleet controlled from the agency’s Marine Operations Center-Pacific in Seattle.
Custer County, Idaho, and the communities of Challis, Mackay, and Stanley completed the NOAA National Weather Service StormReady program, better equipping the county to handle severe weather. The Custer County emergency management team fulfilled a rigorous set of warning and evacuation criteria, including the development of a formal hazardous weather plan.
NOAA released a new report, The State of Deep Coral Ecosystems of the United States, called for in the President’s Ocean Action Plan on December 10. The peer-reviewed report, prepared by NOAA's Coral Reef Conservation Program, provides a baseline for future research and management of these unique and vulnerable ecosystems.
Retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator, announced today that Mary M. Glackin has been appointed as deputy under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere.
A team of scientists took a crucial step forward in NOAA’s effort to prepare U.S. coastal communities, including Long Island, Atlantic City, and Daytona Beach for potentially deadly tsunami and storm-driven flooding. Scientists with NOAA’s National Geophysical Data Center and the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, both based in Boulder, Colo., recently created high-resolution digital elevation models, or DEMs, for the three cities.
The Earth’s tropical belt – approximately the area between the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn – has widened over the past quarter century as the planet has warmed, and could change precipitation patterns that would affect ecosystems, agriculture, and water resources, according to research by a NOAA scientist and colleagues. The findings are published today in the first edition of the new publication Nature Geoscience.
NOAA announced today that the Port of Mobile, Ala. has become the 14th location in the United States to install the Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System. PORTS®, developed and operated by NOAA, provides accurate real-time oceanographic and meteorological data to mariners that can significantly reduce the risk of vessel groundings and increase the amount of cargo moved through the port. The system will become operational on Dec. 3.
Enterprise (Ala.) High School officials and students followed appropriate safety measures prior to and during the March 1 tornado outbreak which killed eight students, but the event further demonstrated the need for such facilities to have hardened safe rooms, according to a NOAA National Weather Service assessment released today.
NOAA’s National Marine Sanctuary Program announced the launch of a new national ocean literacy, education, and public awareness campaign featuring Sanctuary Sam, a California sea lion who will be the program’s “spokes-sea lion” from his SeaWorld-based home in Orlando, Fla.
NOAA Fisheries Service today published its annual List of Fisheries that classifies each U.S. commercial fishery based on its level of interaction with marine mammals.
A new NOAA study, appearing in the current issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows how a prolonged drought in North America in 2002 cut the continent’s natural uptake of carbon dioxide (CO2) in half, leaving more than 360 million tons more of the heat-trapping greenhouse gas in Earth’s atmosphere.
Temperatures in October 2007 were the ninth warmest on record for the contiguous U.S., and especially warm in the Northeast, where five states had their warmest October on record. The January-October 2007 U.S. temperature was the seventh warmest since national records began in 1895, according to scientists at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C.
NOAA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture are soliciting information and ideas on ways to lessen dependence on fish-based feeds in the aquaculture industry. This comment period is the first step of a broad, year-long program that will include research projects, scientific consultations and a national workshop aimed at developing new and effective ingredients for aqua-feed.
NOAA is accepting applications for a scholarship program in honor of retired South Carolina Sen. Ernest F. Hollings, who promoted oceanic and atmospheric research throughout his career. This is the fourth year this scholarship is being made available to students interested in pursuing degrees in ocean and atmospheric sciences and education.
The U.S. Climate Change Science Program published a report today that quantifies North America’s net contribution of carbon to the atmosphere and catalogues sources and sinks of carbon on the continent.
To help protect the highly endangered North Atlantic right whale population, NOAA Fisheries Service is reminding mariners and fishers that the start of calving (birthing) season begins Nov. 15, and continues through April 15. Regulations and recommendations are in place to help protect these endangered whales during this critical period.
NOAA Fisheries Service today proposed limits on fishing three key species in order to end overfishing and promote rebuilding of the stocks. The proposal is based on scientific analysis and recommendations of the Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council and the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission.
A new NOAA study reveals that the level of human development activities, including roadways, sidewalks and roofs, in a watershed has a direct impact on the health of America's tidal creeks and may potentially threaten public health in those coastal areas.
A debris flow and flash flood warning system developed jointly by NOAA’s National Weather Service and the U.S. Geological Survey will help protect Southern Californians from potentially devastating debris flows, commonly known as mud slides, and flash floods in and around burn areas created by the recent wildfires
A new NOAA research model indicates nutrients flowing from the Mississippi River may stimulate harmful algal blooms to grow on the continental shelf off the west coast of Florida. The peer-reviewed hypothesis is being published in a special issue on Florida red tide in the journal "Continental Shelf Research."
A pilotless hurricane hunter is being flown by remote control into hurricane force winds for the first time to give researchers from NOAA and NASA a real time, low altitude look at a storm with hurricane category 1 winds hovering around 80 miles per hour.
NOAA today launched a comprehensive effort aimed at reducing dangerous marine debris. The Internet-based educational campaign for marine debris awareness and prevention answers President Bush's call to increase public awareness and understanding of the global problem of marine debris.
The size of this year's Antarctic ozone hole is slightly above the 10-year average in both depth and overall area, NOAA scientists announced today.
The NOAA National Marine Sanctuary Program has developed a colorful new printed guide and Web page for scuba diving enthusiasts about diving in our nation's 13 national marine sanctuaries, home to some of America's most spectacular underwater sights.
A total of 87 tornadoes were reported in the United States from October 17-19 – a new record outbreak for the month, according to NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.
NOAA has awarded four Honolulu based organizations $500,000 for the first year of a three-year $1.4 million project to improve the understanding of deep water coral reef ecosystems in the Hawaiian Islands.
NOAA has awarded $330,000 to the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, in a five-year $1.8 million NOAA project to help resource managers analyze and predict how hypoxia, water quality, and fishery production respond to nutrient loading and climatic factors in Chesapeake Bay and Delaware inland bays.
NOAA has awarded first-year funding of $284,000 to researchers at the University of Texas at Austin Marine Science Institute (UTMSI) as part of a three-year $781,000 project to develop a better understanding of how nutrient pollution from the Mississippi River affects the large area of low oxygen water called the “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico. The project will also look at how the dead zone affects commercially and recreationally important fish and shellfish.
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