WEEKLY OCEAN NEWS

14-18 July 2008

DataStreme Ocean will return for Fall 2008 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 25 August 2008. All the current online website products will continue to be available throughout the summer break period.

• Check Zenithal Sun -- This week marks one of the two times during the year when the noontime sun is directly overhead to residents on Oahu (Honolulu metropolitan area) (15-16 Jul), while those on the Big Island will experience the noon sun at the zenith in approximately one more week. (22-23 Jul). The other time when Honolulu experienced a zenithal sun was during the last week of May. [US Naval Observatory, Data Services]

Ocean in the News:

• Eye on the tropics ---
  • In the North Atlantic, Tropical Storm Bertha intensified as it continued to travel to the west-northwest, becoming the first hurricane of the 2008 hurricane season at the start of last week. During the early part of the week, Hurricane Bertha had become a major hurricane, reaching category 3 status on the Saffir-Simpson Intensity Scale. By Sunday, Bertha had weakened and was downgraded to a tropical storm as it moved to the northwest toward Bermuda. An image from the MODIS sensor on NASA's Terra satellite shows the characteristic swirl of clouds surrounding Hurricane Bertha at mid-week. [NASA Earth Observatory] An image from NOAA's GOES-12 satellite shows the hurricane late last week. [NOAA OSEI] Additional information and satellite imagery for Hurricane Bertha can be found on NASA's Hurricane page.
  • In the eastern North Pacific, Tropical Storm Elida, the fifth named tropical cyclone of the 2008 hurricane season in that basin, formed early Saturday morning several hundred miles off the coast of Guatemala. As of late Sunday afternoon, this storm was traveling to the west-northwest offshore of the Mexican coast.
• "Red tide" aerosols could produce health treat -- NOAA scientists including those from the agency's Center for Environmental Health and Biomolecular Research recently reported that an algal toxin commonly inhaled in sea spray, attacks and damages DNA in the lungs of laboratory rats. Human inhalation of some of these toxins produced by an organism that is associated with Harmful Algal Bloom or "red tide" has become a public health concern. [NOAA News]
• Tracer experiment conducted in Florida coastal waters --Scientists from NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory have injected two harmless and biodegradable chemical tracers into the outgoing treated wastewater effluent leaving the South Central Regional Wastewater Treatment and Disposal Plant at Delray Beach, FL in an attempt to track the flow the effluent plume along the coastal waters of southeast Florida. [NOAA News]
• Environmental study of San Francisco Bay reserve fleet to be conducted -- During the next two months, NOAA’s Damage Assessment, Remediation and Restoration Program will test bay sediment and bivalve tissue for heavy metals and other contaminants in order to assess the potential environmental impact of more than 70 federally owned obsolete and decommissioned vessels moored in California's Suisun Bay, an arm of San Francisco Bay. [NOAA News]
• Soot from ships being studied -- Scientists from NOAA and the University of Colorado who conducted the first extensive study of the soot emissions into the atmosphere from commercial ships found that tugs produce a significantly larger amount of soot (carbon particles from combustion) than other vessels based on the amount fuel consumed, while large cargo ships generate nearly twice as much soot as previously thought. This soot emission could affect the energy budget and the climate along the commercial shipping lanes. [NOAA News]
• German U-boats off Carolina coast to be explored -- A research expedition is being conducted during the next two weeks by the superintendent of NOAA's USS Monitor National Marine Sanctuary to study the wrecks of three German submarines sunk by US forces in 1942 off the coast of North Carolina during World War II's Battle of the Atlantic. [NOAA News]
• Algae in China's coastal waters -- Images provided in late June by the MODIS instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite shows the algal bloom in the coastal waters off the Chinese city of Qingdao, where the sailing venues will be held for the upcoming 2008 Summer Games to be held in early August. A local cleanup effort has commenced to deal with the algal bloom; daily updated MODIS images will be available through the games. [NASA Earth Observatory]
• US coral reef grades run from "poor" to "fair"-- NOAA recently released a report titled "The State of Coral Reef Ecosystems of the United States and Pacific Freely Associated States: 2008" that includes the assessment of the nation's coral reef ecosystems on a five-tier scale, They found that nearly half of these coral reef ecosystems under US jurisdiction, could be considered in "poor" to "fair" condition. [NOAA News]
• Coral bleaching predictions provide mixed assessments -- The United States Coral Reef Task Force recently issued NOAA's first seasonal coral bleaching outlook for this summer that indicates that the coral reefs in the Caribbean could experience some bleaching, but probably not severe, while the coral in the northwestern Hawaiian Islands could expect more severe bleaching. [EurekAlert!]
• One-third of reef coral could face extinction -- An international team of coral experts warn that one-third of the reef-building corals from around the world could be threatened by extinction because of climate change and destruction by human activity. [EurekAlert!]
• New reefs discovered off Brazil -- Researchers from Conservation International, the Federal University of Espírito Santo and the Federal University of Bahia in Brazil report discovering of reef structures in waters off Brazil that would double the size of the Abrolhos Bank, the largest and richest reef system in the South Atlantic Ocean. [EurekAlert!]
• Climate effects on young fish studied in "seascapes" visualizations -- NOAA scientists from the Northeast Fisheries Science Center have been integrating data collected from their cruises in the coastal waters off New York and New Jersey to develop a three-dimensional visualization of the coastal seascape that they will use to study the climate effects on young fish. [NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center]
• Improved tsunami early warning through higher resolution models -- The team of researchers at Germany's Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research who have been modeling tsunamis have made their high-resolution simulation program available as a German-Indonesian Early Warning System for additional testing later this year. [EurekAlert!]
• Ice bridge to Wilkins Ice Shelf is near collapse -- An animation obtained from images made by the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar onboard the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite from late May through early July shows the disintegration on the ice bridge connecting the Wilkins Ice Shelf and an island of Antarctica. [ESA]
• A forecast is made of Arctic sea ice cover for this summer -- Climate scientists from Germany's Alfred Wegener Institute have predicted that the ice coverage of the Arctic Ocean by the end of this summer is certain to be less than in 2005, which marks the year with the second lowest sea ice extent measured. [EurekAlert!]
• An All-Hazards Monitor --This Web portal provides the user information from NOAA on current environmental events that may pose as hazards such as tropical weather, marine weather, tsunamis, rip currents, Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) and coral bleaching. [NOAAWatch]
• 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:

• 15-16 July 1916...A dying South Atlantic Coast storm produced torrential rains in the southern Appalachian Mountains. Altapass, NC was drenched with 22.22 inches of rain, a 24-hour rainfall record for the Tarheel State, and at the time, a 24-hour record for the U.S. (The current 24-hour rainfall record for the US is 43 inches set 25-25 July 1979 at Alvin, TX). Flooding resulted in considerable damage, particularly to railroads. (David Ludlum) (Intellicast) (NCDC)
• 17 July 1858...The U.S. sloop Niagara departed Queenstown, Ireland to assist in laying the first trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. (Naval Historical Center)
• 17 July 1994...The Polar Sea departed from Victoria, BC on operation Arctic Ocean Section 1994 and became the first U.S. surface vessel to reach the North Pole. She then transited the Arctic Ocean back to her homeport in Seattle, WA. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 17 July 1998...A tsunami triggered by an undersea earthquake destroyed 10 villages in Papua, New Guinea killing an estimated 1500 people, leaving 2000 more unaccounted for and thousands more homeless. (Wikipedia)
• 18 July 1986...Videotapes, taken by the deep-sea Alvin submersible, showing SS Titanic's remains were released. Looking like huge stalagmites, rusticles ("rust icicles") are a byproduct of the bacteria slowly converting the iron in the hull. The colony of iron-eating bacteria flourishes in the anaerobic (without oxygen) environment inside the hollow multi-layered rusticles while on the outside, porous layers support oxygen-dependent bacteria. In this eerie way, there is still life on the Titanic as the ship lies deep on the ocean floor. (Today in Science History)
• 18-19 July 1979...A 30-foot high tsunami wave leveled four Indonesian villages on the Sunda Islands during the night. The wave swept 1500 feet inland, causing 589 deaths among the sleeping villagers. A landslide from Mount Werung (Lomblen Island) caused the tsunami. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 18-22 July 1997...Hurricane Danny, the only hurricane that made landfall in the continental US in 1997, moved inland into coastal Alabama at a snails pace. Radar storm total estimates of 43 inches over Mobile Bay. A torrential 32.52 inches of rain fell on 19-20 July at Dauphin Island Sea Lab, establishing a 24-hour maximum precipitation record for Alabama. (NCDC) (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 19 July 1843...The first all-metal liner, the SS Great Britain, was launched from Bristol, England. Designed by I. K. Brunel, the SS Great Britain was the first of the great steamships. She was the world's first screw-propeller driven (and first iron-hulled) steamship to cross the Atlantic (1845). The six-masted, single-screw, 3,270-ton vessel is 322 feet in length overall and carried a crew of 130 including 30 stewards for her 360-seat dining room. As the world's biggest ship of the time, she embarked on a varied career, first as a luxury liner carrying passengers to New York and Melbourne, then as a ferry carrying troops to the Crimea and India, and finally as a cargo ship, before being abandoned in the Falkland Islands in 1886. She was brought back to Bristol on this day in 1970, where she is now being restored by volunteers to her original appearance at the Great Western Dock in which she was built. (Today in Science History)
• 19 July 1886...A hurricane from the Gulf of Mexico crossed Florida causing great damage from Cedar Keys to Jacksonville. This was the third hurricane in one month to cross the Florida peninsula. (David Ludlum) (Intellicast)
• 19 July 1897...LT Robert E. Peary, USN, departed on a year long Arctic Expedition that made many important discoveries, including one of largest meteorites, Cape York. (Naval Historical Center)
• 19 July 1994...Hurricane Emilia was the first of three Category-5 hurricanes to develop in the Central Pacific in 1994 as unusually warm sea temperatures prevailed south of Hawaii. Sustained winds reached 160 mph. (Intellicast)
• 20 July 1964...Four Navy divers entered Project SEALAB I capsule moored 192 feet on the ocean floor off Bermuda for a 11-day experiment. On the 22^nd they submerged and then surfaced on 31 July 1964. (Naval Historical Center)
• 20 July 1985...Treasure hunters found the Spanish galleon Nuestra Senora de Atocha, which sank approximately 40 miles off the coast of Key West, FL, in 1622 during a hurricane. The ship contained over $400 million in coins and silver ingots. (InfoPlease.com)

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Prepared by AMS DS Ocean Central Staff and Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
ã Copyright, 2008, The American Meteorological Society.