I hope you received the announcement yesterday from GCOOS Board Chair Joe Swaykos announcing Dr. Jorge Brenner as GCOOS’s new Executive Director. (Details here.) I have every confidence that Jorge  will be a great asset to GCOOS and I hope you’ll join all of us here in welcoming him aboard.

As I write my last note to you as Executive Director, we are once again carefully watching new tropical storms form and head toward the Gulf.

Coastal resilience is a popular phrase these days, and I can't think of a better way to describe Gulf of Mexico residents than resilient!

We love the Gulf for all it has to offer — boating, fishing, beaches — and huge contributions to the U.S. economy through maritime trade and energy. And yet, we face many challenges — severe weather, subsidence, hypoxia, harmful algal blooms, to name a few of our challenges.

The dedication and passion that GCOOS members demonstrate for the Gulf has energized me over my last seven years leading this organization and I thank you all for supporting the GCOOS mission.

I’d also like to thank the volunteer Board of Directors who take precious time away from their busy lives to guide and support the organization. It has been my pleasure working with each and every one of them. I’d also like to thank the GCOOS staff who have worked so tirelessly by my side.

There is so much more work to be done to meet our goals for a fully operational observing system in the Gulf, and I know Jorge will bring new ideas and energy to GCOOS to continue to move us forward. I’m sure that he’ll be met with the same unwavering support that you’ve all shared with me over the years.

Of course, I won't be going too far — I’ll spend the next few months as a Senior Advisor, helping Jorge transition into his new role; then I will focus on special projects — particularly HABs. You will still find me at barb.kirpatrick@gcoos.org.

Thank you for your support,

Dr. Barbara Kirkpatrick

Executive Director

GCAN Steering Committee and Science Working Group Member Dr. Katie Shamberger has received funding from the National Science Foundation’s Division of Ocean Sciences for new in-situ sensors. Shamberger is a chemical oceanographer with Texas A&M University's Oceanography Department focused on the ocean carbon cycle. The SAMI-pH and SAMI-CO2 sensors will soon be deployed on deep-sea coral reefs (~600-1000 m) in the North Pacific for a year.

NOAA's Ocean Acidification Program (OAP) and National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) have published the proceedings of the virtual Harmful Algal Blooms and Ocean Acidification Workshop (technical report). The report includes an executive summary, overviews of the presentations and discussions on each day of the workshop and a summary of the workshop results. In addition, the appendices contain the workshop agenda, participant list, and regional breakout summaries.

Frontiers in Climate is still accepting submissions for its special issue “Democratizing Data: Environmental Data Access and its Future.” Manuscripts are due Aug. 24 (with slight flexibility on the deadline).

Human Health and SafetyHeHEALTH

The Red Tide Respiratory Forecast — part of a suite of NOAA tools focused on predicting the movements and impacts of harmful algal blooms in the Gulf of Mexico — has moved from “experimental” to “operational” or “sustained.

That means the Respiratory Forecast, developed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NOAA-NCCOS) in partnership with GCOOS, the state of Florida and others, is now fully supported and available to the public. The Forecast provides a near real-time prediction of whether beachgoers can expect red tide conditions on individual beaches at three-hour increments throughout the day. This risk-level forecast for red tide respiratory impacts covers about 30 of Florida’s west coast beaches, along with beaches in Texas.

Florida Sea Grant has been leading a project to develop a more strategic red tide communications plan that aligns the needs of agencies and resource managers with the needs of the end-users who benefit from the information. Accurate and effective communication is essential for ensuring public safety and protection of local economies.

The team, led by Dr. Lisa Krimsky and including GCOOS Outreach and Education Manager Dr. Chris Simoniello, has been gathering information through a series of focus groups with Florida’s natural resource managers, public health officials, and members of the business, tourism and media communities. They’ve also surveyed Florida residents.

The $92,471 project, funded through Florida’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, also includes compiling information about past red tide communications’ projects.

Results should be available this fall.

Do airborne cyanotoxins impact human health? Researchers from Florida Gulf Coast University are looking into the question on Florida’s Lake Okeechobee as part of the Harmful Algal Bloom Assessment of Lake Okeechobee System (HALO) project. This GCOOS-Florida Atlantic University-Harbor Branch Oceanographic Institute project is developing a comprehensive sensing and information visualization package aimed at combatting Florida freshwater eutrophication, harmful algae proliferation, and ultimately protect human and ecosystem health.

FGCU researchers have deployed bulk air samplers to determine whether (and to what extent) airborne toxin concentrations elevate during and immediately following large bloom events. Parallel studies are also exploring the relationship between airborne toxin concentrations and human exposure.

The HAB Observing Group is beginning a new webinar series to provide a forum for HAB observing experts, system operators, manufactures, data managers and others to share ideas and lessons learned. The series builds on work to establish an operational HAB Observing Network.

The first webinar will be an overview of the Implementation Strategy for a National Harmful Algal Bloom Observing Network presented by Dr. Greg Doucette, NOAA-NCCOS.

Louisiana State University (LSU) and the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium (LUMCON) have released the report from their annual research cruise to map the size of the hypoxic zone near the mouth of the Mississippi River. The cruise ground-truths predictions released earlier this summer, in which GCOOS members Dr. Nancy Rabalais and Dr. R. Eugene Turner predicted a slightly smaller than average dead zone: 4,761 square miles (95 percent confidence interval between 4,014 and 5,524 square miles).

The bottom area of low oxygen in Louisiana coastal waters west of the Mississippi River, commonly known as the dead zone, was mapped from July 25–31 and estimated at 16,400 square kilometers (6,334 square miles). The 2021 size is the 16th largest in 35 years of hypoxia data and equivalent to more than four million acres of habitat potentially unavailable to fish and bottom species.

“The distribution of the low dissolved oxygen was unusual this summer,” Rabalais said. “The area from the Mississippi River to the Atchafalaya River, which is usually larger than the area to the west of the Atchafalaya, was smaller. The area to the west of the Atchafalaya River was much larger. The low oxygen conditions were very close to shore with many observations showing an almost complete lack of oxygen.”

New research is allowing marine managers, scientists, and anyone who cares about the Gulf of Mexico’s fish to determine just how many are created in the Gulf’s coastal habitats. The new tool from The Nature Conservancy — a seagrass and salt marsh calculator — estimates the number of juvenile fish and invertebrates that are produced in nursery habitats across the Gulf.

The deadline is drawing near to make nominations to the Gulf Environmental Protection and Stewardship Board. The Board will advise the Gulf Research Program on its programmatic focus areas related to the protection and stewardship of environmental resources in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico region related to the effects of climate change, offshore hydrocarbon production and transportation and other human activities.

The Coastal Conservation Association (CCA) of Louisiana, in cooperation with Chevron and the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, is making final preparations for two new artificial reef projects to be deployed in Louisiana’s near-shore waters this month. The large reefs will be located in Bay Marchand Block 3 and South Timbalier Block 51. CCA Louisiana has partnered with local and national companies to sustain its conservation and habitat program, which builds artificial reefs and floating islands to promote new fish habitats and replace disappearing lands along the coast and beyond.

UG2 — the Underwater Glider User Group — will host their next webinar this Wednesday, Aug. 18. It will include an update on UG2 activities by Coordinator Bill Lingsch, NOAA-GCOOS, and Nick Rome, Consortium for Ocean Leadership; presentations from Greg Ikeda and Eric Rehm of Sea-Bird Scientific on sensor technology; and discussion of best practices and communications, industry engagement, sustained operations and training led by the steering committee.

With tropical storms Fred passing through and Grace teeing up this week, it’s timely to share new reports resulting from NOAA’s Hurricane Intensity Forecasts Workshop. The Leadership, Steering Committee and Extreme Events-Ocean Observations Task Team broke the recommendations into two reports:

GCOOS maintains a listing of funding opportunities. Have an opportunity you'd like to advertise? Email Laura Caldwell

13-17: The 3rd NOAA Workshop on Leveraging AI in Environmental Sciences — a hybrid event. “Transforming Weather, Climate Services, and Blue Economy with Artificial Intelligence.”

21-23: GOMA Team Mid-Year meetings, Biloxi. Hybrid virtual/in-person meeting. Details to come.

20-23: Global Oceans 2021

28 September - 1October: National Coastal Conference, New Orleans, Loisiana "GEAUX Resilient"

25-27: MTS 15th Buoy Workshop, Wilmington, North Carolina. "Moored Systems for the Future." Abstracts due Sept. 1.

26-28: GCOOS Fall Members Meeting. New Orleans, Louisiana.

1-4, 8-11: CERF Biennial Conference virtual conference

3-4: Esri Ocean, Weather, and Climate GIS Forum

13-17: AGU Fall Meeting, New Orleans, Louisiana and Online Everywhere

23-27: American Meteorological Society, 102nd Annual Meeting, Houston, Texas

27 Febr - 4 March: ASLO/TOS Ocean Sciences Meeting , Honolulu, Hawaii

Dr. Barbara Kirkpatrick, Executive Director • Bill Lingsch, U.S. Glider User Group Coordinator • Dr. Chris Simoniello, Outreach & Education Coordinator • Dr. Kerri Whilden, Oceanographer • Felimon Gayanilo, Systems Architect, Co-Data Manager • Dr. Shinichi Kobara, Assistant Research Scientist, Product Developer •  Bob Currier, Research Specialist, Product Developer, Co-Data Manager • Marion Stoessel, Senior Research Associate • Jennifer Vreeland-Dawson, Research Associate • Grant Craig, Program Coordinator • Stephanie Watson, CETACEAN Coordinator • Nadine Slimak, Public Relations & Content Marketing, Vetted Communications, LLC • Dr. Chuan-Yuan Hsu, Post Doctoral Research Associate • Robbie Iles, Graduate Research Assistant • Laura Caldwell, Program Assistant

info@gcoos.org • 979.847.8879

In Memoriam: Matt Howard, 1952-2018