WEEKLY OCEAN NEWS

4-8 June 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:

• "Break the Grip of the Rip®" -- NOAA officials have designated this upcoming week of 3-9 June 2007 as national Rip Current Awareness Week. Using the theme, Break the Grip of the Rip®, efforts are meant to heighten public awareness of rip currents at surf beaches that claim the lives of as many as 100 people in the United States annually. [NWS Rip Current Safety] New York and Wisconsin also have identified this upcoming week as Rip Current Awareness Week.
• World Ocean Day to be celebrated -- World Ocean Day or a "Celebration of the Sea" will be celebrated on Friday, 8 June 2007 in an effort to increase public awareness and to foster public involvement in the management of the ocean and its resources. Although this date was created at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, it has not been officially recognized by the United Nations. A partial listing is provided for events across the US and other nations that will celebrate World Ocean Day. [The Ocean Project]
• Eye on the tropics -- The 2007 North Atlantic Hurricane season began last week with some activity:
  • Tropical Storm Barry, the second named tropical cyclone (low-pressure system) of the season formed in the southern Gulf of Mexico late Friday afternoon and moved to the northeast toward the central Florida Peninsula, making landfall near Tampa Bay on Saturday morning. Barry moved northeastward across Florida and weakened to a tropical depression near Jacksonville by early evening. [USA Today]
  • Tropical Storm Barbara, the second named tropical cyclone of the 2007 eastern North Pacific season, formed off the Mexican coast early last week and drifted slowly east toward the Guatemalan coast, making landfall on Saturday near the Guatemalan-Mexican border, before being downgraded to a tropical depression by late afternoon. [USA Today] An image obtained from sensors onboard NOAA's GOES-12 satellite shows the clouds associated with Tropical Storm Barbara last Thursday. [NOAA OSEI]
  • Tropical Storm Alvin, the season's first named tropical system in the eastern North Pacific had formed near the end of the previous week and moved as a minimal tropical storm westward away from the Mexican coast before dissipating at the end of this past week more than 1000 miles southwest of Cabo San Lucas at the southern tip of Mexico's Baja California. An image obtained last week from NOAA's GOES-11 satellite shows the clouds accompanying Tropical Storm Alvin. [NOAA OSEI]
  • Tropical Cyclone Gonu formed in the Arabian Sea (the northern Indian Ocean west of India) over this past weekend and moved to the northwest, increasing in strength to become a Category 2 system on the Saffir-Simpson Scale with maximum sustained surface winds of 105 mph late Sunday evening.
• Hot towers help intensify hurricanes -- Scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center who have been analyzing data from Hurricane Bonnie obtained from the Precipitation Radar and the Visible and Infrared Sensor on the TRMM (Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission) satellite indicate that hurricanes intensify by feeding on the towering thunderstorm clouds that develop in the eyewall that surrounds the central eye of the hurricane. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• Satellites ready for seasonal increase in distress calls-- NOAA officials recently reported that the fleet of polar and geosynchronous satellites operated by NOAA is ready for the potential increase in distress calls from emergency locator beacons that are carried on boats and aircraft as well as hand-held personal devices. These satellites, along with Russia's Cospas spacecraft, represent a part of the international Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking System, called COSPAS-SARSAT. [NOAA News]
• A survey marker dedicated to "inner space science" -- NASA recently presented NOAA with a survey marker that was placed near the NOAA Aquarius underwater research laboratory off the coast of Key Largo, FL, to be used as a reference for coral surveys conducted by NOAA and by NASA astronauts in training. It also commemorates the joint effort by these two federal science agencies at exploring "inner space." .[NOAA News]
• Tropical cyclones found to have a climate-control role -- Researchers at Purdue University report that they found evidence that tropical cyclones, such as hurricanes, serve as a thermostat by cooling the tropics, resulting in modulating the North Atlantic ocean circulation patterns that transport heat and affect the climate of North America and Europe. [Purdue University]
• Monsoon history linked to changes in global climate -- Researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and at Germany's Kiel University report that their reconstruction of a 155,000 year-long continuous monsoon history in equatorial West Africa from a sediment core obtained from the Gulf of Guinea indicates that the strength of this monsoon regime can be tied to the Northern Hemisphere’s climate shifts due to the expansion and contraction of the European and North American continental ice sheets and the amount of local solar radiation incident upon equatorial Africa. [EurekAlert!]
• Robotic sub reaches bottom of world's deepest sinkhole -- A robotic submersible vehicle, called the Deep Phreatic Thermal Explorer, equipped with autonomous navigation and mapping systems reached a depth of 318 meters below the ocean surface and generated a sonar map of the bottom of Mexico's El Zacatón sinkhole. [EurekAlert!]
• Tracking huge storm-generated waves -- French scientists recently tracked the progression of huge waves that were generated by a storm in the Indian Ocean from data collected by the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite. They detected waves with heights of up to 11 meters that had been generated by a storm off Cape Town, South Africa strike Reunion Island and then Indonesia some 10,000 km distant after a span of nine days. [ESA]
• A climate signal detected in Indian Ocean -- Oceanographers at Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) report that their examination of a 40-year time series of Indiana Ocean temperatures near Australia reveals a signature of climatic change associated with increased surface temperatures, but a sub-surface cooling in the tropics. [CSIRO]
• International Polar Year exploration and research receives funding -- Thirty-three scientific investigations that will involve exploration and interdisciplinary research in the polar regions as part of the current International Polar Year are to be funded by NASA. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• 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:

• 4 June 1825...A hurricane struck Long Island, NY leveling trees and causing damage to ships. The early season hurricane, which originated near Cuba, caused major damage along the Atlantic coast from Charleston, SC to New York City. Many were lost at sea. (David Ludlum)
• 4 June 1976...Forty-foot waves from a tropical cyclone smashed Gogha (port), India. Excellent warnings limited the death toll to approximately 70. Dredging of the harbor at Bhavnnagar ceased for several years as storm runoff from the Kansa River washed away accumulated sand and silt. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 6 June 1882...More than 100,000 inhabitants of Bombay, India were killed as a tropical cyclone that developed over the Arabian Sea pushed huge waves into the harbor. (Wikipedia)
• 7 June 1914...The first vessel, the Alliance, passed through the Panama Canal. The 51-mile long canal, which links the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans across the isthmus of Panama, was officially opened on 15 August 1914. (Today in Science History) (Wikipedia)
• 7 June 1924...The Oil Pollution Act was passed. It was enforced by the Coast Guard.
  Protection of halibut in the North Pacific Ocean was placed under Bureau of Fisheries (Coast Guard- enforced since 1926). (USCG Historian's Office)
• 7 June 1972...Richmond, VA experienced its worst flood of record as rains from Hurricane Agnes pushed the water level at the city locks to a height of 36.5 feet, easily topping the previous record of thirty feet set in 1771. (The Weather Channel)
• 7-10 June 2001...Tropical Storm Allison made landfall along the Texas Gulf Coast near Galveston early on the 6^th and drifted northward before becoming stationary as a depression later in the day near Lufkin. Later, it began to drift back southward, moving offshore over the Gulf late on the 9^th at nearly the same place as it had made landfall. Allison caused disastrous flooding across the Upper Texas Gulf Coast, especially in the Houston area where a storm total of 36.99 inches fell at Port Houston. Twenty-three people lost their lives in Texas. Damage in the region amounted to $5 billion, which included 45,000 homes, 70,000 vehicles and 2000 businesses. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 8 June 1937...Observation of the total eclipse of the sun was made by a U.S. Navy detachment commanded by Captain J. F. Hellweg, USN, which was participating in the National Geographic Society - United States Navy Eclipse Expedition at Canton Island in the Phoenix Islands, Pacific Ocean. USS Avocet was assigned to this expedition. (Naval Historical Center)
• 8-9 June 1990...The Norwegian tanker Mega Borg released 5.1 million gallons of oil some 60 nautical miles south-southeast of Galveston, TX, the result of an explosion and subsequent fire in the pump room. Two crewmembers were killed. Coast Guard units fought the resulting fires and recovered spilled oil. (Information Please) (USCG Historian's Office)
• 8 June 1992...The first World Ocean Day was celebrated, coinciding with the Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. (Wikipedia)
• 9 June 1534...The French navigator Jacques Cartier became the first European explorer to discover the river that he named the St. Lawrence in present-day Quebec, Canada. (The History Channel)
• 9 June 1966...Hurricane Alma made landfall over the eastern Florida Panhandle near Alligator Point during the evening-- the earliest land-falling hurricane on the U.S. mainland on record. Peak sustained winds were near 90 mph. Highest winds reached 125 mph and lowest pressure 970.2 millibars (28.65 inches) were reported at the Dry Tortugas on the 8^th. (Intellicast) (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 9 June 1990...San Diego, CA set a new record rainfall amount on this date, as 0.38 inches of rain fell breaking the old record of 0.13 inches established in 1892. Moisture from the remains of Hurricane Boris was responsible for this rare rain event. (Intellicast)
• 10 June 1909...The International Distress Call (SOS distress signal) was used for the first time in an emergency. The Cunard liner SS Slavonia used the signal when it wrecked off the Azores. Two steamers received her signals and went to the rescue.

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