WEEKLY OCEAN NEWS

11-15 May 2009

DataStreme Ocean will return for Fall 2009 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 31 August 2009. All the current online website products will continue to be available throughout the summer break period.

Ocean in the News:

Eye on the tropics -- The first two typhoons of 2009 developed over the western sections of the North Pacific Ocean last week.
At the start of the week, Typhoon Kurija developed northeast of the Philippines and traveled to the northeast, intensifying to become a major category 4 typhoon (on the Saffir-Simpson Scale). Near the end of the week, this typhoon weakened to a tropical storm and dissipated. For more information and satellite images on Typhoon Kurija, see the NASA Hurricane Page.
Typhoon Chan-Hom developed early in the week over the South China Sea and briefly became a category 2 typhoon on the Saffir-Simpson Scale as it moved to the north and then to the northeast, crossing Luzon, in the northern Philippines. Remnants of this system continued to travel to the northeast across the western Pacific during the weekend. Satellite images and additional information can be found on the NASA Hurricane Page.
Hurricane season begins in the eastern North Pacific -- The 2009 hurricane season in the eastern North Pacific Ocean basin begins on Friday, 15 May 2009. The hurricane season in the North Atlantic basin, including the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico will begin in two weeks on 1 June. The official hurricane seasons in both basins end on 30 November 2009. NOAA has declared the week of 24-30 May 2009 to be Hurricane Awareness Week across the nation.
North American Safe Boating Week -- Commencing this coming Saturday, the week of 16-22 May has been declared 2009 National Safe Boating Week, to help kick off the 2009 North American Safe Boating Campaign. Check the Safe Boating Week site maintained by the Safe Boating Council.
New weather and water monitoring system aids mariners using a Louisiana port -- NOAA has recently installed its Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS®) at the Port of Lake Charles, LA, which provides real-time observations of tides, currents, water and air temperature, barometric pressure, winds and bridge clearance that can be used without charge by mariners using the port. [NOAA News]
New ocean current data can improve search and rescue activities -- A joint effort conducted by NOAA, the Mid-Atlantic Coastal Ocean Observing Regional Association, the US Coast Guard and the Department of Homeland Security has produced a new set of ocean current data that can be used by various search and rescue efforts over the waters along the East Coast to track the probable paths of victims and drifting survivor craft. The near surface ocean current data sets from high-frequency radar systems are part of the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS®). [NOAA News]
Indian Ocean buoy network to improve monsoon predictions -- An array of moored buoys, called the "Research Moored Array for African-Asian-Australian Monsoon Analysis and Prediction", has been deployed across the Indian Ocean that will collect meteorological and oceanographic data to help scientists predict the dramatic variations between seasonal monsoon rains and droughts across south Asia, equatorial Africa and Australia. [NOAA News]
Online help provided for collection of oral history of fishing culture -- NOAA’s Fisheries Service has recently placed a new handbook online that provides educators, community groups and the public a detailed roadmap of how to design and conduct oral history projects that celebrate the people, history and culture of the nation's coastal and Great Lakes fishing communities. [NOAA News]
Sea otters in Pacific Northwest could be threatened by disease -- Researchers from NOAA’s Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have found that many of the sea otters that reside in the coastal waters of Washington State are exposed to the same types of pathogens that have been responsible for causing disease in marine mammals elsewhere around the nation. [NOAA News]
North Atlantic shrimp populations responding to climate changes -- Researchers from NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, Canada's Bedford Institute of Oceanography, the United Kingdom, Iceland, Denmark and Norway have determined that the size of the North Atlantic shrimp populations depends upon timing of the ocean water temperature and that the size of the shrimp catch could serve as an indicator of changes in climate. These researchers based their study on the timing of the annual shrimp hatch between 1998 and 2007 across the North Atlantic Ocean, basing their analysis on satellite images that reveal the timing of spring phytoplankton blooms based on ocean color. [Northeast Fisheries Science Center]
New ocean cooperative institute formed -- NOAA officials have announced that a new cooperative institute will be created at the Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute at Florida Atlantic University in Fort Pierce, FL that will focus on ocean exploration, research and technology development for the East Coast of the US. Partners along with NOAA are the University of North Carolina Wilmington, SRI International and the University of Miami. [NOAA News]
An expedition is made to an erupting undersea volcano -- During the last month, researchers from Oregon State University, the University of Washington, the University of Oregon, NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory and Canada's University of Victoria used Jason, a remotely operated vehicle operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, to study the environment around a underwater volcano in the Mariana Island chain at a depth of approximately 1700 feet below the ocean surface. The scientists found that the volcano built a cone approximately 120 feet high during the last 5 years and that the animal population on top of the volcano has increased significantly. [EurekAlert!]
Monitoring changes in Antarctic ice sheet using new technology -- Scientists working with the British Antarctic Survey have been employing a variety of new tools such as satellite images, ice-penetrating radar and sonar to monitor the movement of ice from the interior of Antarctica toward the coast, as well the extent of the Antarctic Ice Sheet. One of the goals of their research is to correctly estimate the contribution of ice melt to changes in global sea level. [EurekAlert!]
Experiment shows that atmospheric carbon does not reach deep ocean -- Oceanographers with the US Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who collected particulate carbon data from the deep-diving Carbon Explorer floats in the Southern Ocean following the Southern Ocean Iron Experiment (SOFeX), an iron-fertilization experiment, indicate that much of the carbon from plankton blooms never reaches the deep oceans. Their discovery runs counter to those efforts proposed to sequester large amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide by fertilizing plankton with iron in those iron-poor regions of the world's oceans in an attempt to reduce increases in global temperature. [Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory]
Contractor selected to build next generation weather satellites -- NOAA and NASA officials recently announced that they have selected Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co. to build two satellites for the GOES-R series, which represents NOAA's next generation of geosynchronous (or geostationary) satellites that would be launched beginning in 2015. These satellites will have a lightning activity detection system for over land and oceans and will be able to provide improved observations of sea surface temperatures. [NOAA News]
Dinosaurs may not have been wiped out by a meteorite -- A research team from Princeton University, Switzerland's University of Lausanne and Spain's CES Fundación San Valero claims that it has collected biotic evidence from several sites in the United States, Mexico and India indicating volcanoes were responsible for the demise of dinosaurs approximately 65 million years ago, thereby refuting the popular theory that an asteroid or meteorite strike had been the culprit. The geoscientists also believe that a massive tsunami did not necessarily occur, as would be suggested by an asteroid impact. [Princeton University]
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:

11 May 1833...The ship Lady of the Lake struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic while bound from England to Quebec, resulting in the loss of 215 lives. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
11-12 May 1965...The first of two cyclones that struck East Pakistan (now called Bangladesh) during the year made landfall. This system, along with the one on 1-2 June killed about 47,000 people.
12 May 1916...Plumb Point, Jamaica reported 17.80 inches of rain in 15 minutes, which set a world record. (The Weather Doctor)
12 May 1978...The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced that they would no longer exclusively name hurricanes after women.
14 May 1836...U.S. Exploring Expedition authorized to conduct exploration of Pacific Ocean and South Seas, the first major scientific expedition overseas. LT Charles Wilkes USN, would lead the expedition in surveying South America, Antarctica, Far East, and North Pacific. (Naval Historical Center)
15 May 1934...Lightship No. 117, occupying the Nantucket Shoals Station, in a dense fog, was struck by the RMS Olympic and sank on station with the loss of seven crewmembers. (USCG Historian's Office)
15-24 May 1951...Hurricane Able did a "loop-the-loop" north of the Bahamas and reached Category 3 strength off Cape Hatteras, NC. (The Weather Doctor)
16 May 1917...Marquette, MI had its latest opening of navigation on Lake Superior in history. (Intellicast)
17-21 May 1887...An early season tropical storm raked Cuba and The Bahamas. (The Weather Doctor)
17 May 1970...The Norwegian ethnologist, Thor Heyerdahl, and a multinational crew set sail on a trans-Atlantic voyage from Morocco on Ra II, a papyrus sailing craft modeled after the ancient Egyptian vessels in an effort to prove his theory that Mediterranean sailors reached the Americas in ancient times. After 57 days, the Ra II reached Barbados. (The History Channel)