What’s an ocean glider?

VIDEO: What’s an ocean glider? This is an outline in below two minutes. Transcript

Scientists at the moment are experimenting with utilizing gliders to find populations of spawning fish. The glider illustrated right here is outfitted with an acoustic receiver to “pay attention” for vocalizations—grunting sounds—made by some fish as they mass collectively to spawn within the U.S. Caribbean. The car information the geolocation of the sounds that it “hears” onto an onboard reminiscence card. Study extra.

Do you know?

In 2009, a glider named the “Scarlet Knight” made historical past by crossing the Atlantic Ocean from New Jersey to Spain. Study extra.

An ocean glider is an autonomous, unmanned underwater car used for ocean science. Since gliders require little or no human help whereas touring, these little robots are uniquely suited to gathering information in distant areas, safely and at comparatively low price.

Gliders could also be geared up with all kinds of sensors to observe temperature, salinity, currents, and different ocean situations. This data creates a extra full image of what’s occurring within the ocean, in addition to tendencies scientists won’t in any other case be capable to detect from satellites or giant analysis ships.

Whereas there are various glider designs that use completely different strategies to maneuver via the water, all gliders share the power to journey far distances over lengthy intervals, with out servicing. Unmanned gliders pattern the ocean in locations the place it’s impractical to ship individuals, and at a fraction of the price, permitting us to gather information even in the course of a hurricane. It’s these traits together with developments in sensor applied sciences that make gliders more and more essential as instruments for gathering ocean information.

The glider illustrated on this animation is the Slocum glider. It could seem like a torpedo, however it doesn’t have propellors or an inner engine. As an alternative, it makes use of a pump to softly change its buoyancy over time. This permits the glider to slowly transfer up and down via the water. And because it does so, the massive fins protruding of the edges of the craft create carry to propel it ahead. It’s just like how a glider within the air works, besides the ocean glider can glide up as simply because it glides down.

Video Transcript

An ocean glider is autonomous: it travels via the ocean with out human assist. It’s pre-programmed with journey waypoints after which let out to gather ocean information for days, weeks, or months. Totally different sensors mounted on the glider accumulate completely different sorts of knowledge. This glider is fitted with an acoustic sensor to pay attention for and report noises made by fish throughout spawning season. After gathering information for a set time period, the glider completes its journey. The glider then surfaces and transmits its place so individuals can come choose it up. Mission full!

What’s a Excessive Seas Forecast?

map of high seas forecast areas

NOAA’s Excessive Seas Forecasts are marine climate forecasts ready for mariners and transmitted world wide in real- and near-real-time. Word: the above map i

Seafaring could be very harmful for ships at sea. For hundreds of years, little may very well be executed to make transport safer, as a result of unpredictability of the climate, the huge measurement of the ocean, and an absence of worldwide cooperation within the open ocean. Nevertheless, the 1912 sinking of the “unsinkable” Titanic, with greater than 1,500 casualties, sparked world concern about security and requirements for ships at sea. This tragedy would result in new worldwide conventions that established security necessities and offered extra correct and standardized climate forecasts.

As we speak, Nationwide Meteorological and Hydrological Companies world wide present real- or near-real-time climate forecasts and information which can be transmitted globally. The World Meteorological Group’s (WMO) International Observing System depends on member international locations, which use their services on land, at sea, and in area through satellites to forecast climate situations. Collectively, these assets enable meteorological and different environmental observations on a world scale.

As a member of WMO, NOAA’s Nationwide Climate Service (NWS) gives Excessive Seas Forecasts for giant areas of the U.S. Atlantic and Pacific oceans. The NWS additionally gives marine forecasts for U.S. coastal areas and the Nice Lakes, offshore waters, and a part of the Arctic Ocean. The NWS’s Unified Floor Evaluation of world climate additionally gives information on a posh set of floor observations. These forecasts from NOAA, in addition to predictions from different Nationwide Meteorological and Hydrological Companies world wide, can be found to anybody, and, most significantly, to all ships at sea.

What are microplastics?


VIDEO: What are microplastics? This is what it is advisable know in lower than a minute. Transcript


Plastic is essentially the most prevalent kind of marine particles present in our ocean and Nice Lakes. Plastic particles can are available in all sizes and styles, however these which might be lower than 5 millimeters in size (or concerning the measurement of a sesame seed) are known as “microplastics.”

Microbeads are tiny pieces of polyethylene plastic added to health and beauty products, such as some cleansers and toothpastes

Microbeads are tiny items of polyethylene plastic added to well being and wonder merchandise, comparable to some cleansers and toothpastes.

As an rising discipline of examine, not so much is understood about microplastics and their impacts but. The NOAA Marine Particles Program is main efforts inside NOAA to analysis this matter. Standardized discipline strategies for gathering sediment, sand, and surface-water microplastic samples have been developed and proceed to endure testing. Ultimately, discipline and laboratory protocols will permit for world comparisons of the quantity of microplastics launched into the atmosphere, which is step one in figuring out the ultimate distribution, impacts, and destiny of this particles.

Microplastics come from a wide range of sources, together with from bigger plastic particles that degrades into smaller and smaller items. As well as, microbeads, a sort of microplastic, are very tiny items of manufactured polyethylene plastic which might be added as exfoliants to well being and wonder merchandise, comparable to some cleansers and toothpastes. These tiny particles simply move by water filtration programs and find yourself within the ocean and Nice Lakes, posing a possible risk to aquatic life.

Microbeads should not a latest downside. In response to the United Nations Setting Programme, plastic microbeads first appeared in private care merchandise about fifty years in the past, with plastics more and more changing pure elements. As just lately as 2012, this challenge was nonetheless comparatively unknown, with an abundance of merchandise containing plastic microbeads in the marketplace and never quite a lot of consciousness on the a part of customers.

On December 28, 2015, President Obama signed the Microbead-Free Waters Act of 2015, banning plastic microbeads in cosmetics and private care merchandise.

Video Transcript

Plastic is in all places. A variety of it results in the ocean. Most plastics within the ocean break up into very small particles. These small plastic bits are known as “microplastics.” Different plastics are deliberately designed to be small. They’re known as microbeads and are utilized in many well being and wonder merchandise. They move unchanged by waterways into the ocean. Aquatic life and birds can mistake microplastics for meals. Analysis is being performed. However there’s nonetheless a lot we do not know. In 2015, the U.S. banned the usage of microbeads. However microplastics are nonetheless an enormous downside. You possibly can assist maintain plastic out of the ocean. Bear in mind: Scale back. Reuse. Recycle.

What are seashore advisories and seashore closures?

Throughout a seashore closure, water situations are deemed unsafe for swimmers and different customers. A seashore advisory leaves it as much as customers as to whether or not they want to threat going into the water. Proven right here: Coastal areas throughout the Nationwide Park Service’s Golden Gate Nationwide Leisure Space in San Francisco Bay, California, had been closed to guests throughout the Cosco Busan oil spill in 2007.


A seashore advisory leaves it as much as customers as to whether or not they want to threat going into the water. Within the case of a seashore closure, the state and/or native authorities decides that water situations are unsafe for swimmers and different customers.

How can beach-goers keep away from the frustration of arriving at their summer season trip vacation spot solely to seek out that authorities advise them to not swim there or that the seashores are closed altogether?

Sadly, there is no such thing as a central database that gives info on seashore closures and advisories in actual time. One of the simplest ways to seek out info on the present water high quality of a specific seashore is to plan forward.

In some instances, warning indicators will probably be posted to alert individuals of the potential threat of sickness from contact with the water. Indicators could also be positioned for short-term issues or extra everlasting ones, when, for instance, repeated monitoring signifies ongoing contamination.

Frequent Culprits Resulting in Seaside Closures and Advisories

Frequent culprits resulting in seashore closures and advisories embrace extreme rainwater that carries air pollution from storm drains (like motor oil, pet waste, pesticides, trash, and pathogens) to leisure waters; “purple tides” and different dangerous algal blooms; and sewage and chemical spills from identified sources. It’s usually sensible to keep away from swimming after heavy rains or if the water is an uncommon shade with out first checking with native or state well being authorities.

In the Gulf of Mexico, NOAA’s Dangerous Algal Bloom Operational Forecast System identifies doubtlessly dangerous blooms of the poisonous alga Karenia brevis, the place the blooms are, how huge they’re, and the place they’re prone to go.  The toxins produced by the algae develop into airborne when waves break alongside the seashore throughout a bloom, inflicting eye, throat, and nostril irritation in most beach-goers, however extra extreme reactions in individuals with bronchial asthma and different respiratory points.

Forecasts are distributed via situations reviews and bulletins. Circumstances reviews, which embrace forecasts of potential ranges of respiratory irritation related to blooms of the alga Okay. brevis within the near-term, are posted twice per week after affirmation of a HAB, and as soon as weekly throughout the inactive HAB season. Extra bloom evaluation is included in dangerous algal bloom bulletins which are emailed to a subscriber listing of state and native coastal useful resource managers, public well being officers, and researchers. In many instances, NOAA’s dangerous algal bloom information contribute to authorities’ choice to publish a seashore closure or advisory.

How does sand kind?

giant bumphead parrotfish

The enormous bumphead parrotfish is an incredible fish that may stay to be 40 years outdated, rising as much as 4 ft lengthy and 100 kilos. They use their massive head bumps to actually bump heads throughout aggressive shows, when massive numbers of fish mixture to spawn on a lunar cycle. The bumphead parrotfish excretes white sand, which it could produce on the price of a number of hundred kilos a 12 months!


The environmentalist Rachel Carson wrote, “In each curving seashore, in each grain of sand, there’s a story of the Earth.”

Sand comes from many areas, sources, and environments. Sand varieties when rocks break down from weathering and eroding over 1000’s and even thousands and thousands of years. Rocks take time to decompose, particularly quartz (silica) and feldspar.

Typically beginning 1000’s of miles from the ocean, rocks slowly journey down rivers and streams, continuously breaking down alongside the best way. As soon as they make it to the ocean, they additional erode from the fixed motion of waves and tides.

The tan shade of most sand seashores is the results of iron oxide, which tints quartz a lightweight brown, and feldspar, which is brown to tan in its unique kind. Black sand comes from eroded volcanic materials reminiscent of lava, basalt rocks, and different dark-colored rocks and minerals, and is usually discovered on seashores close to volcanic exercise. Black-sand seashores are frequent in Hawaii, the Canary Islands, and the Aleutians.

The by-products of dwelling issues additionally play an vital half in creating sandy seashores. Bermuda’s preponderance of pleasantly pink seashores outcomes from the perpetual decay of single-celled, shelled organisms referred to as foraminifera.

Much less frequent however no much less inviting seashores, devoid of quartz as a supply of sand, depend on a wholly totally different ecologic course of. The well-known white-sand seashores of Hawaii, for instance, truly come from the poop of parrotfish. The fish chew and scrape algae off of rocks and useless corals with their parrot-like beaks, grind up the inedible calcium-carbonate reef materials (made principally of coral skeletons) of their guts, after which excrete it as sand. On the identical time that it helps to take care of a various coral-reef ecosystem, parrotfish can produce a whole bunch of kilos of white sand every year!

So the subsequent time you unfurl your seashore towel down by the shore, ponder the sand beneath you, which, as Rachel Carson mentioned, is telling you a narrative concerning the Earth. It’s possible you’ll be about to comfortably nestle down within the stays of million-year-old rocks. Then once more, chances are you’ll quickly come to relaxation upon an limitless heap of parrotfish poop.

What’s a present survey?

Do you know?

An Operational Forecast System offers a nowcast and forecast (as much as 48 hours) of water ranges, currents, salinity, water temperatures, and winds for a given space. These methods are positioned in coastal waters and the Nice Lakes in important ports, harbors, and estuaries.

NOAA’s Heart for Operational Oceanographic Merchandise and Companies offers tidal present predictions to business and leisure mariners who depend on this data for protected navigation.  With the intention to present probably the most correct predictions attainable, NOAA should periodically resurvey numerous coastal and estuarine areas.  Survey areas are chosen based mostly on mariners’ navigation wants, oceanographic analyses, and the period of time that has handed because the final survey. Given trendy enhancements in measurement and computing know-how, these surveys vastly enhance the accuracy of tidal predictions. In 2017, for instance, NOAA concluded a three-year present survey of Puget Sound, Washington, to replace the area’s tidal present predictions. Previous to the survey, predictions had been based mostly on restricted quantities of information collected within the Nineteen Thirties-Nineteen Sixties.

To gather the info they want, NOAA scientists usually deploy Acoustic Doppler Present Profilers (ADCPs) to measure currents all through the water column at numerous areas for a interval of 1 to 4 months. The observations collected from the ADCPs are used to generate tidal present predictions at these areas.  Along with present measurements, NOAA typically deploys salinity, temperature, oxygen, and stress sensors at choose areas to trace the motion of assorted water lots. Whereas the mixed information is used to create higher tidal prediction fashions, additionally it is used to help the creation of NOAA Operational Forecast System (OFS) hydrodynamic fashions.  These fashions present short-term forecasts of water ranges, currents, water temperature, and salinity in coastal areas. 

Infographic Transcript: Coastal & Estuarine Present Surveys

Instrument Deployments: Annually NOAA measures ocean currents at completely different coastal and estuarine areas by deploying dozens of short-term devices.

Currents: Ocean currents describe the motion of water from one location to a different. Currents are noticed at depths all through the water column and are measured over a interval from one to 4 months.

Acoustic Doppler Present Profiler (ADCP): This instrument measures the currents by emitting beams of sound, which mirror off of particles within the water and again to the ADCP.

Harmonic Evaluation: After the ocean present measurements are collected, oceanographers obtain
the info after which analyze it via a pc program. A statistical course of
known as harmonic evaluation determines the half of the present attributable to the tides.
This “tidal present” can then be predicted at that location for a few years into the
future. Different components that affect the present, resembling wind, can’t be forecast for
various days and aren’t included within the prediction.

Tidal Present Predictions: Within the graph above, NOAA predicts at “Lovely Bay” that the tidal present will flood (stream inland) at 1 pm, slack (low present pace) at 4 pm, and ebb (stream out to sea) at 7 pm. The quickest currents seem at peak flood and ebb.

How are present predictions used? Because of NOAA tidal present predictions, kayakers trying to depart “Lovely Bay” know to keep away from the time of peak flood at 1pm after they could be paddling
towards the present. Tidal present predictions present important data for each
leisure and business marine navigation. Predictions of the tidal present might be
accessed on-line for 1000’s of coastal and estuarine areas.

 

Can we clear up, cease, or finish dangerous algal blooms?

A harmful algal bloom outbreak on Lake Erie viewed from space

Imagery of the Western Lake Erie dangerous algal bloom from September 26, 2017. The scum proven right here close to downtown Toledo stretched all the best way to Lake Ontario. This picture is from Landsat-8 (a NASA/USGS satellite tv for pc).

Dangerous algal blooms — also known as HABs for brief — happen when algae produce poisonous or dangerous results on individuals, fish, shellfish, marine mammals, birds, or different aquatic organisms. Blooms happen in marine and freshwater environments all through the world, with damaging ecological, social, and financial results.
So why can’t we clear up the algae and maintain this downside? Sadly, the reply just isn’t so easy. Dangerous algal blooms are a pure course of. There are data of HABs from early European colonists arriving to Florida within the 1500s. Nonetheless, analysis factors to a rise within the frequency and depth of algal blooms in fashionable instances as a consequence of environmental modifications brought on by people.

There are lots of examples of human actions that contribute to HABs: runoff from agriculture, dissolved chemical compounds launched into water provides through rainfall or irrigation, and effluent from sewage therapy vegetation all contribute to extra quantities of vitamins in our waterways. These vitamins are meals for algae. In housing developments, for instance, retention ponds are a typical place to see freshwater HABs. All this runoff results in the water system, ultimately making its solution to the ocean.

Certainly one of main missions of NOAA’s Nationwide Facilities for Coastal Ocean Science is to empower communities to take motion on HAB points by creating detection instruments and forecasts. NCCOS is concerned in mitigating dangerous algal blooms in quite a few alternative ways and thru a number of legislative measures. For instance, the Dangerous Algal Bloom Hypoxia Analysis and Management Act offers NOAA with a authorized mandate to check HABS, to mitigate their results, and to supply early warning for when and the place blooms will happen. NOAA companions with different organizations all through the nation, as nicely, to assist analysis by way of three funding alternatives:

  1. The Ecology and Oceanography of Dangerous Algal Blooms program offers funding for universities and different teams to take a look at the ecology and oceanography of HABS.

  2. The Monitoring of and Occasion Response to Dangerous Algal Blooms program focuses on a sensible method to strategies for testing applied sciences to detect toxins within the cells of the algae and characterize their abundance.

  3. The Prevention, Management and Mitigation of Dangerous Algal Blooms program focuses on what could be carried out to forestall individuals from coming into contact with HAB impacts, to raised inform the general public and to supply extra directed early warning merchandise for dangerous algal blooms.

Dangerous algal bloom assets, incessantly requested questions, and regional data can be found through the Nationwide Ocean Service HAB portal.