20-24 December 2004

DataStreme Ocean will return for Spring 2005 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 17 January 2005. All the current online homepage products will continue to be available throughout the break period.

• Seaplane found in Hawaiian waters -- A team from NOAA, the University of Hawaii and the National Park Service located the wreckage of the "Marshall Mars", a large US Navy flying boat aircraft in the waters off Oahu near the site of the previously discovered Japanese mini-submarine that was sunk just before the Pearl Harbor attack. [NOAA News]
• Assessing the 2004 hurricane season-- Hurricane experts and other scientists are currently assessing the data collected during the recently-concluded and very active 2004 hurricane season in the North Atlantic. Teams of NOAA scientists along with colleagues from other federal agencies have been conducting hurricane research projects that have involved the testing of new equipment and techniques that monitored the hurricanes and provided data for forecast models. [NOAA Magazine] At Louisiana State University, researchers are examining a variety of hurricane issues pertaining to the Gulf Coast, to include the design of hurricane shelters, the effect of beach erosion on barrier islands and the methodology of hurricane evacuation. [LSU News]
• How will El Niño affect the Northwest? Based upon the current weak El Niño pattern, climatologists are offering differing views as to the effects of this anomalous atmospheric and oceanic circulation regime will have upon the weather patterns during the upcoming winter across the Pacific Northwest. [USA Today]
• Detailed mapping of sea-surface temperatures in the Mediterranean displayed -- The European Space Agency unveiled a high-resolution map of the sea-surface temperatures across the Mediterranean that is updated daily based upon data received from multiple satellites as part of its Medspiration Project. [ESA]
• Looking at earth and its polar ice from space -- NASA researchers and colleagues from the university community have been monitoring the polar ice caps for several decades using data collected from a variety of polar orbiting satellites. Some of the information that these researchers have found that the ice cover has changed rapidly near the poles and could affect the sea level. [NASA] Recently, a new NASA satellite called the Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) has onboard lasers that make measurements of the changes in the heights of glaciers and ice caps with unprecedented accuracy. [NASA]
• Exploring ocean color on the Web -- NASA has unveiled a new Internet tool called "Giovanni" that will permit users, to include high school and college students as well as researchers, to access and analyze ocean color data obtained from orbiting satellites. [NASA]
• Big crab catch is a concern -- A large catch of Dungeness crabs along the West Coast at the beginning of the current season has sparked concern that too many crabs have been caught too early to maintain the crab population. [ENN]
• Flooding from ancient glacial lake suspected in onset of cold period -- A scientist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution reported that analysis of sediment cores indicates that once the dam holding the huge Glacial Lake Iroquois broke and caused catastrophic flooding of the Hudson River Valley approximately 13,400 years ago, with the meltwater entering the North Atlantic and changing the course of the Gulf Stream, which may have helped trigger the Intra-Allerød Cold Period. [Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]
• Ice cores reveal past climate history -- Glaciologists and other scientists at Ohio State University reported that ice cores they obtained from the Greenland ice sheet show a long-term account of annual snowfall that could provide an extended record of the North Atlantic Oscillation. [Ohio State University]
• Unusual wave behavior could affect beach erosion -- Scientists at Ohio State University studying beach erosion along the Atlantic coast of North Carolina have detected an intricate pattern of water flow at the surface and within the surf zone. [Ohio State University]
• Ocean circulation shutdown could cause climatic change -- A scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign recently cautioned that if global warming caused the thermohaline circulation of the North Atlantic Ocean to shut down, then catastrophic climatic change could result, especially if the shutdown were not reversible. [EurekAlert!]
• Waste heat could be used in desalination -- Researchers from the University of Florida report that they have developed a process where waste heat from electrical power plants could be used in desalination plants. [EurekAlert!]
• Global and US Hazards/Climate Extremes-- A review and analysis of the global impacts of various weather-related events, including drought, floods and storms during the current month. [NCDC]
• Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com] Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

• 20 December 1987...Worst peacetime shipping disaster occurred as the Dona Paz, a Philippine ferry, sank after collision with oil tanker Vector off Mindoro island, setting off a double explosion. As many as 1749 confirmed deaths, but the death toll was probably closer to 3000.
• 21 December 1163...A hurricane hit villages in Holland/Friesland, causing floods.
• 21 December 1872...The HMS Challenger set sail from Portsmouth, England on the 4-year scientific expedition that would lay the foundation for the science of oceanography. (Wikipedia)
• 21 December 1936...Ice breaking operations in channels and harbors by the US Coast Guard was authorized by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in Executive Order No. 7521. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 22 December 1832...The HMS Beagle and Charles Darwin reached the Barnevelts Islands
• 22 December 1837...Congress authorized the President "to cause any suitable number of public vessels, adapted to the purpose, to cruise upon the coast, in the severe portion of the season, and to afford aid to distressed navigators." This statute was the first authorizing activities in the field of maritime safety, thereby interjecting the national government into the field of lifesaving for the first time. Although revenue cutters were specifically mentioned, the performance of this duty was imposed primarily upon the Revenue Marine Service and quickly became one of its major activities. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 22 December 1894...The Dutch coast was hit by a hurricane.
• 23 December 1811...A cold storm hit Long Island Sound with a foot of snow, gale force winds, and temperatures near zero. During the storm, many ships were wrecked, and in some cases, entire crews perished. (David Ludlum)
• 23 December 1854...A tsunami struck the coast of Japan, with water in the harbor of Simoda changing depth between 8 and 40 feet. Twelve hours later this giant wave reached the Pacific coast of the U.S. The newly installed self-registering tide gauges noted these waves. The information derived from this event enabled Alexander D. Bache, Superintendent of the U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, to apply a newly derived law relating ocean depth to wave speed and provide the first relatively accurate scientific estimate of the depth of an ocean between Japan and the Pacific coast of the U.S. The velocity of the sea wave from Simoda to San Francisco was 369 mph. (Today in Science)
• 25 December 1492...The Santa Maria, one of the ships that Christopher Columbus used, landed at the Dominican Republic.
• 25 December 1974...Tropical Cyclone Tracy (a hurricane in the waters surrounding Australia) made landfall near Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia. Excellent warnings kept the death toll to between 50 and 60, with more than 20,000 people were evacuated in the week following the storm. Some areas were totally devastated. Peak wind speeds reached exceeded 174 mph. (The Weather Doctor) (Accord's Weather Calendar)
• 26-31 December 1993...The Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race off Australia was plagued by hurricane-force wind gusts in excess of 74 mph and 33 foot high seas. Of 104 starters, only 37 yachts finished the race. On the 28^th, one yacht owner spent five hours in the water after being swept overboard. (Accord's Weather Calendar)

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URL: DSOcean/news.html

Prepared by AMS DSOcean Central Staff and Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
ã Copyright, 2004, The American Meteorological Society.