WEEKLY OCEAN NEWS

30 April -4 May 2007

DataStreme Ocean will return for Fall 2007 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 27 August 2007. All the current online website products will continue to be available throughout the summer break period.

Ocean in the News:

• More hurricane buoys deployed -- With the start of the 2007 North Atlantic hurricane season one month away, the NOAA Data Buoy Center recently deployed two new instrumented buoys in Atlantic and Caribbean waters off Puerto Rico to help monitor the near surface atmospheric and oceanic environmental conditions. These two buoys are the first of eight buoys that are to be deployed this hurricane season across the southwestern North Atlantic to help hurricane forecasters. [NOAA News]
• Hurricane hunter aircraft to make East Coast tour -- In an attempt to increase public awareness to hurricane preparedness along the vulnerable coastal sections of the Atlantic Seaboard, forecasters from the National Hurricane Center will travel on one of NOAA's hurricane hunter aircraft this week. Their five day Hurricane Awareness Tour will start Monday in Kingston, RI and end Friday in Daytona Beach, FL. National Hurricane Preparedness Week will be in three weeks (20-26 May 2007). [NOAA News]
• Volunteer opportunities showcased -- The NOAA administrator recently unveiled a new website that serves as a portal displaying the variety of opportunities available within NOAA to those volunteers desiring to support environmental stewardship, such as with the National Weather Service, the Ocean Service and the Fisheries Service. [NOAA News]
• Interesting wave pattern in the Messina Strait -- An image obtained from the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on NASA's Terra satellite shows an interesting interfering wave pattern that appeared in waters of the Messina Strait between mainland Italy and Sicily [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Decades-old oil spill remains problem for Cape Cod -- Researchers at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution have found that a marsh on Cape Cod still contains some lingering and chronic biological effects of a fuel oil spill that occurred along the beaches of the Cape in 1969. [Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]
• Icelandic whalers await decision -- Whalers from Iceland who hunted and caught fin whales following their government's decision to resume whaling are still awaiting a decision that will allow them to sell the whale meat on the international market. [BBC News]
• Earliest Carboniferous rainforest uncovered -- Scientists from the United Kingdom's University of Bristol and colleagues from the US found fossil evidence in an Illinois coal mine of a rainforest that had flourished during the Carboniferous Period (300 million years ago). This forest was preserved as a major earthquake at that time caused the whole region to subside below sea level and to be preserved when buried in mud. [EurekAlert!]
• Volcanoes linked with ancient global warming -- A team of scientists from Oregon State University, Rutgers University and Denmark's Roskilde University claim that they have found a link between massive volcanic eruptions on Greenland's east coast and the western British Isles approximately 55 million years ago and a 220,000-year Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum period that saw sea surface temperatures increase by 5 Celsius degrees in the tropics and 6 Celsius degrees in the Arctic. They suggest a release of large amounts of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide and methane, into the atmosphere. [EurekAlert!]
• Changes in climate could enhance fish growth -- Researchers with Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation have found that changes in the growth rates and productivity of some coastal and deep sea fish species in the western South Pacific appear to correspond with changes in water temperatures and wind patterns over these waters. [CSIRO]
• A space-age view of historic Venice -- A photograph taken by an astronaut on the International Space Station shows the watery environment surrounding the historic Italian city of Venice. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Subglacial lakes and ice streams under the Antarctic ice -- Scientists using a variety of techniques have found as many as 140 subglacial lakes located under Antarctica's ice sheet along with the flow of water under the ice from one lake to another in what is known as "ice streams." Some of these ice stream flow to the Southern Ocean and could affect sea level. [NASA Earth Observatory] Images taken approximately three years apart of the surface of the West Antarctica's ice sheet by MODIS sensors on NASA's satellites were compared to determine changes in elevation of these surfaces that may be associated with the flow of water in the ice streams. [NASA Earth Observatory] Under the East Antarctic Ice Sheet, one of the ice streams is the Recovery Ice Stream. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• International workshop to study Antarctic ice and climate change -- An international workshop of ANDRILL (ANtarctic geological DRILLing) researchers will be held this upcoming week at the Antarctic Marine Geology Research Facility at Florida State University, which houses a large collection of Antarctic sediment cores. One of the new acquisitions to the collection is a deep-sea core obtained from under Antarctica's Ice that provides a nearly 10 million year record of the ice shelf's history. [EurekAlert!]
• Satellites used to monitor warming of the globe -- Participants at the European Space Agency's 2007 Envisat Symposium have seen how the variety of instruments on environmental observation satellites have been able to detected various changes to Earth's environment that have occurred due to increases in the planetary average temperature over the last several decades, including changes in polar ice and glaciers, as well as plankton blooms in the ocean. [ESA]
• Ocean's "twilight zone" may play role in climate change -- A biogeochemist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution along with colleagues recently reported on the results from the VERTIGO (Vertical Transport In the Global Ocean) expeditions to the Pacific Ocean that suggest carbon dioxide is often recycled by living organisms within the dimly lit "twilight zone" in the ocean and could reenter the atmosphere relatively quickly. [EurekAlert!]
• May is National Wetlands Month -- The US Environmental Protection Agency, along with other federal agencies and environmental groups, has announced that May has been designated as American Wetlands Month in an effort to increase public awareness of the importance for protecting and preserving the nation's wetlands. The theme is "It Pays to Save Wetlands". [EPA-Wetlands]
• 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.

• Historical Events:

• 30 April 1492...Spain gave Christopher Columbus his commission of exploration. (Wikipedia)
• 30 April 1894...An Antarctic iceberg fragment was sighted at a latitude comparable to Rio de Janeiro. Reported by the ship Dochra, this sighting remains the nearest to the equator that an iceberg has been seen. (Today in Science History)
• 30 April 1991...Southeast Bangladesh was devastated by a tropical cyclone with sustained winds of approximately 150 mph during the early morning. A 20-foot storm surge inundated offshore islands south of Chittagong, taking water from the Bay of Bengal inland for miles. This cyclone resulted in up to 200,000 deaths and $1.4 billion damage. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
• 1 May 1683...A patent was awarded in England for the extraction of salt from seawater. (Today in Science History)
• 1 May 1883...At Cape Lookout, NC, a storm tide swept over the island drowning sheep and cattle. (Intellicast)
• 1 May 1921...The first radio fog signals in the United States were placed in commission on Ambrose Lightship, Fire Island Lightship, and Sea Girt Light Station, NJ. These signals installed by the US Lighthouse Service were meant to guide ships approaching New York Harbor. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 1 May 1936...The Whaling Treaty Act outlawed the taking of right whales or calves of any whale. This law was enforced by the Coast Guard. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 2 May 1775...Benjamin Franklin completed the first scientific study of the Gulf Stream. His observations began in 1769 when as deputy postmaster of the British Colonies he found ships took two weeks longer to bring mail from England than was required in the opposite direction. Thus, Franklin became the first to chart the Gulf Stream. (Today in Science History)
• 2 May 1880...The first U.S. steamboat to successfully employ electric lights was the Columbia, a 309-ft long vessel which operated between San Francisco, CA and Portland, OR. An "A" type dynamo was placed in operation to illuminate the passenger rooms and main salons. (Today in Science History)
• 2 May 1932...After a Convention with Canada, the Northern Pacific Halibut Act re-enacted the Act of 7 June 1924 and made it unlawful to catch halibut between 1 November and 15 February of each year in territorial waters of United States and Canada, as well as on the high seas, extending westerly from there, including the Bering Sea. The Coast Guard enforced this act. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 2-3 May 1998...Ocean swells from storms in the South Pacific caused surf heights of 7 to 9 feet, with sets to 12 feet along the southern California coast. A man fishing on rocks at Rancho Palos Verdes, CA was swept away. (Accord Weather Guide Calendar)
• 3 May 1494...The explorer Christopher Columbus sighted the island of Jamaica in the West Indies. He named the island Santa Gloria. On the following day, he landed on Jamaica. (Library of Congress)
• 3 May 1761...Large tornadoes swept the Charleston, SC harbor when a British Fleet of 40 sails was at anchor. It raised a wave 12 feet high, leaving many vessels on their beam-ends. Four people drowned. (Intellicast)
• 4 May 1869...The first U.S. patent for an offshore oil-drill rig was issued to T.F. Rowland for his "submarine drilling apparatus" (No. 89,794). (Today in Science History)
• 4 May 1904...Construction began on the Panama Canal. (Wikipedia)
• 4 May 1910...Congress required every passenger ship or other ship carrying 50 persons or more, leaving any port of United States to be equipped with radio (100-mi radius) and a qualified operator. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 5 May 1990...A strong Pacific cold front moving rapidly inland caused weather conditions at the east end of the Strait of Juan de Fuca in Washington State to quickly change from sunny and calm to westerly winds of 60 mph and ten-foot waves. Three recreational fishing boats capsized in heavy seas off Port Angeles resulting in five deaths. (The National Weather Summary) (Storm Data)
• 6 May 1994...The rail tunnel under the English Channel, or "Chunnel," that connects Folkestone, England, with Sangatte, France was officially opened by Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and French President Mitterrand. (The History Channel)

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Prepared by AMS DS Ocean Central Staff and Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
© Copyright, 2007, The American Meteorological Society.