Weekly Ocean News

DATASTREME OCEAN WEEK FIVE: 1-5 October 2007

Ocean in the News

(Thurs.) Rare albino ratfish found -- A rare albino ratfish was caught in Puget Sound waters near Whidbey Islands as part of a project conducted by the University of Washington research project aimed at examining the food chain in Puget Sound, the nation's second largest estuary. [EurekAlert!]
(Thurs.) Tropical caves provide paleoclimate proxy records -- Scientists at Georgia Tech have found that the stalagmites retrieved from caves on the island of Borneo help provide a 25,000-year paleoclimatic record of an equatorial rainforest which they claim shows the important role of the equatorial Pacific in influencing large-scale climate change. The researchers have compared these records with polar ice core records. [EurekAlert!]
(Tues.) Ocean iron fertilization project studied -- An international symposium held last week at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution had scientists, policymakers and industrial leaders discuss the issues and potential implications involved with the proposed fertilization of the ocean with iron as an intentional means for slowing rises of global temperature. [Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]
(Tues.) Environment preceding "Great Oxidation Event" is studied -- Scientists at the University of Maryland and Arizona State University who analyzed 2.5 billion-year old rocks collected from West Australia conclude that significant changes in the oxidation state of the environment occurred within both the earth's ocean and atmosphere within 40 million years prior to the "Great Oxidation Event" when microbial life arose at the end of the Archean Eon (~3.9 - 2.5 billion years ago). [EurekAlert!] University of Alberta scientists have dated this "Great Oxidation Event" at between 2.3 to 2.4 billion years ago. [EurekAlert!]
Eye on the tropics ---
- The eastern North Atlantic basin remained active. A tropical depression formed early last week over the central tropical Atlantic and intensified to become Tropical Storm Karen, the eleventh named tropical cyclone of the hurricane season as it moved to the west-northwest. By Saturday, it had dissipated east of the Leeward Islands. An image made by NOAA's GOES-12 satellite shows the clouds surrounding Tropical Storm Karen on Friday. [NOAA OSEI]
  Tropical Storm Lorenzo formed over the southwestern Gulf of Mexico early last week and intensified to become the fourth hurricane of the season before making landfall along the Gulf coast of southeastern Mexico early Friday. The torrential rain from former Hurricane Lorenzo produced flooding rain and mudslides that killed five people in eastern Mexico. [USA Today] An image obtained from data collected by the instruments on NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite shows the large rainfall rate in the eyewall surrounding Hurricane Lorenzo as the hurricane was about to make landfall. [NASA Earth Observatory] An earlier image from NOAA's GOES-12 satellite showed Tropical Storm Lorenzo before it reached hurricane status over the southern Gulf of Mexico. [NOAA OSEI]
  A tropical depression formed in the eastern part of the basin near the Cape Verde Islands at the end of last week. By Saturday, it had intensified to Tropical Storm Melissa, the thirteenth named tropical cyclone of the 2007 North Atlantic hurricane season. However, by Sunday, this tropical storm had weakened as it moved to the west-northwest and was downgraded to a tropical depression.
- In the eastern North Pacific basin, a tropical depression formed early Saturday and became the tenth named tropical cyclone of the season in that basin by afternoon. As of Sunday afternoon, Tropical Storm Juliette was moving to the northwest across the Pacific well to the west of the Mexican coast.
- In the western North Pacific basin, Tropical Storm Francisco weakened and dissipated over the Gulf of Tonkin early last week. Tropical Storm Lekima formed this Sunday (local time) over the South China Sea west of the Philippines and traveled west toward central Viet Nam.
Record setting loss in Arctic ice documented -- An image obtained from the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR-E) Instrument on NASA’s Aqua satellite in mid-September 2007 shows the smallest areal extent of Arctic sea ice in recorded history. A graph shows the seasonal decline in sea ice for this record-setting season, the previous record 2005 season and the long term (1979-2000) average. [NASA Earth Observatory]
Concerns about rising sea level -- The President of the Maldives, a nation on an Indian Ocean archipelago, recently warned that his nation could become uninhabitable before the end of this century because of projected increases in global sea level unless significant cuts in greenhouse gas emissions are implemented. [Reuters]
Increases in carbon dioxide did not end last Ice Age -- An earth sciences professor at the University of Southern California claims that deep-sea temperatures rose about 19,000 years ago, or approximately 1300 years prior to increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide, thereby ruling out the role that this greenhouse gas would have been the primary driver for the end of the last Pleistocene Ice Age. [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.

Concept of the Week: The Ocean and the Global Radiation Budget

The ocean is an important player in the radiational heating and cooling of Planet Earth. For one, covering about 71% of Earth's surface, the ocean is a primary control of how much solar radiation is absorbed (converted to heat) at the Earth's surface. Also, the ocean is the main source of the most important greenhouse gas (water vapor) and is a major regulator of the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO₂), another greenhouse gas.

On an annual average, the ocean absorbs about 92% of the solar radiation striking its surface; the balance is reflected to space. Most of this absorption takes place within about 200 m (650 ft) of the surface with the depth of penetration of sunlight limited by the amount of suspended particles and discoloration caused by dissolved substances. On the other hand, at high latitudes multi-year pack ice greatly reduces the amount of solar radiation absorbed by the ocean. The snow-covered surface of sea ice absorbs only about 15% of incident solar radiation and reflects away the rest. At present, multi-year pack ice covers about 7% of the ocean surface with greater coverage in the Arctic Ocean than the Southern Ocean (mostly in Antarctica's Weddell Sea).

The atmosphere is nearly transparent to incoming solar radiation but much less transparent to outgoing infrared (heat) radiation. This differential transparency with wavelength is the basis of the greenhouse effect. Certain trace gases in the atmosphere absorb outgoing infrared and radiate some of this energy to Earth's surface, thereby significantly elevating the planet's surface temperature. Most water vapor, the principal greenhouse gas, enters the atmosphere via evaporation of seawater. Carbon dioxide, a lesser greenhouse gas, cycles into and out of the ocean depending on the sea surface temperature and photosynthesis/respiration by marine organisms in surface waters. Cold water can dissolve more carbon dioxide than warm water so that carbon dioxide is absorbed from the atmosphere where surface waters are chilled (at high latitudes and upwelling zones) and released to the atmosphere where surface waters are heated (at low latitudes). Photosynthetic organisms take up carbon dioxide and all organisms release carbon dioxide via cellular respiration.

Concept of the Week: Questions

If the ocean's pack ice cover were to shrink, the ocean would absorb [(more)(less)] solar radiation.
All other factors being equal, if sea surface temperatures were to rise, the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide dissolved in surface ocean waters would likely [(increase) (decrease)].

Historical Events

1 October 1844...U.S. Naval Observatory headed by LT Matthew Fontaine Maury occupied its first permanent quarters. (Naval Historical Center)
1 October 1846...The British naturalist Charles Darwin, ten years after his voyage on the Beagle, began his study of barnacles, which was to appear in four volumes on living and fossil Cirripedes (barnacles). For his observations, he had a single lens microscope made to his own design. (Today in Science History)
1 October 1976...Hurricane Liza brought heavy rains and winds to Brazos Santiago, Mexico, causing a dam to break on the Cajoncito River, which killed 630 people as a wall of water crashed into the town of La Paz. (The Weather Doctor)
1 October 1893...The second great hurricane of the 1893 season hit the Mississippi Delta Region drowning more than 1000 people. (David Ludlum)
2 October 1836...The British naturalist Charles Darwin returned to Falmouth, England, aboard the HMS Beagle, ending a five-year surveying expedition of the southern Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, that included visits to Brazil, the Galapagos Islands, and New Zealand. The information and experience obtained from this voyage led Darwin to develop his historic work on the theory of evolution and the 1859 publication entitled, The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. (The History Channel)
2 October 1867...A hurricane struck Galveston, TX with a storm tide that caused $1 million damage. (Intellicast)
2 October 1882...A major hurricane struck the Louisiana Delta with 100-mph winds and 12-ft storm tide which inundated the bayous resulting in 1500 deaths. (Intellicast)
2 October 1898...A hurricane struck the Weather Bureau (now National Weather Service) hurricane observation post at Carolina Beach, North Carolina and swept away the office's outhouse. The storm became known as the "Privy Hurricane". (Northern Indiana NWSFO)
3 October 1841...The "October Gale," the worst of record for Nantucket, MA, caught the Cape Cod fishing fleet at sea. Forty ships were driven ashore on Cape Cod, and 57 men perished from the town of Truro alone. Heavy snow fell inland, with 18 inches reported near Middletown, CT and 3 inches at Concord, MA. (David Ludlum)
4 October 1582...The Gregorian Calendar was implemented by Pope Gregory XIII to correct for an increasing discrepancy between the leap year corrections of the Julian Calendar and the actual length of the year marked by the Earth's orbit of the sun. In Italy, Poland, Portugal, and Spain, 4 October of this year was followed directly by 15 October, skipping over 10 days. (Wikipedia)
4 October 1869...A great storm struck New England. The storm reportedly was predicted twelve months in advance by a British officer named Saxby. Heavy rains and flooding plagued all of New England, with strong winds and high tides along the coast of New Hampshire and Maine. Canton, CT was deluged with 12.35 inches of rain. (David Ludlum)
5 October 1972...Heavy rains, mostly the remnants of Tropical Storm Joanne, fell across much of Arizona. It was believed to be the first time in Arizona weather history that a tropical storm entered the state with its circulation still intact. The center was over Flagstaff early on the 7th. (3rd-7th) (The Weather Channel)
5-7 October 1999...A storm southeast of New Zealand caused surf to reach heights of 12 ft along the south shores of all the Hawaiian Islands, flooding some roads and parking lots. The lobby of the Kihei Beach Resort on Maui and three ground floor units were flooded. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
7 October 1737...A furious cyclone in the Bay of Bengal caused a major disaster at the mouth of the Hoogby River near Calcutta, India. As many as 300,000 people were killed, mainly as the result of the storm's forty foot high surge. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)