This month, GCOOS Executive Director Dr. Jorge Brenner is settling in — getting to know GCOOS and its many data partners as his tenure gets off to a busy start with Hurricane Ida, Hurricane Nicholas and Gulf waters ripe for more hurricane formation and intensification in an already-busy hurricane season that is just now at its peak.

In this Q&A, you can learn about his long-term fascination with the ocean, how he became interested in sustainability and climate change and what his early priorities are at GCOOS.

GCOOS will hold its fall meeting virtually this year, so please mark your calendar now and plan to join us to meet Dr. Jorge Brenner, our new Executive Director, hear about updates in the Gulf ocean observing community and more. Members and non-members are welcome to attend! Full agenda to be determined — we’ll send out a special meeting notice soon.

NOAA’s U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) Office has announced 11 new five-year cooperative agreements that support regional associations like GCOOS in the continued growth, expansion, and modernization of our nation’s climate, coastal, ocean, and Great Lakes observing capabilities. In the first year, NOAA will distribute $41 million to cover efforts along U.S. national and territorial waters and coasts.

The GCOOS funding will support projects and programs that include water quality monitoring for biological parameters, including harmful algal blooms; uncrewed glider operations to enhance hurricane modeling and forecasting to protect communities; and enhance high-frequency radar coverage.

Our thoughts are with those still being impacted by the aftermath of Hurricane Ida and, more recently Nicholas. We know that recovery, damage assessment and cleanup are ongoing and will take time.

As Hurricane Ida passed through the Gulf in August, the Stones Metocean Observatory surface buoy broke free of its mooring and began drifting west. Stones is a long-term deep ocean observatory in the Gulf of Mexico created from a converted ocean mooring owned by Shell. GCOOS has suspended the data stream until it can be recovered and reinstalled. (Usually at https://stonesdata.tamucc.edu)

We’ll keep you posted on the buoy and its data.

In the meantime, we’re gathering information about hurricane damage that has occurred to any ocean observing data network, platform or asset. We’ll use the information to help develop a wider storm damage assessment for the Gulf ocean observing community and to garner support for rebuilding and repairing these essential tools.

Continuous, in situ water quality data throughout the Caloosahatchee Estuary in Florida helps our partners at the Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation monitor conditions using real-time data. The River, Estuary, and Coastal Observing Network (RECON) consists of eight water quality sensors that have been deployed since 2007 providing a comprehensive, long-term data set of water quality parameters such as salinity, temperature, chlorophyll, oxygen, turbidity, and more. These data help determine where nutrient and algal bloom hotspots occur and can be used to evaluate habitat quality for important species such as seagrass and oysters.

For more than three decades, Dr. Nancy Rabalais — professor and Shell Endowed Chair in Oceanography and Wetland Studies, Department of Oceanography & Coastal Sciences at Louisiana State University and founding GCOOS Board Member — has studied the hypoxic zone in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Her collaborative research has documented and tracked the links between this deoxygenation and agricultural practices, and her findings have led to federal legislation concerning the diminished water quality.

Human Health and SafetyHeHEALTH

GCOOS and Florida Sea Grant have released a new Red tide Communications Plan for Florida, a report designed to advance red tide communications by aligning practitioner needs with end-user wants.

More than 1,100 Florida residents and natural resources, public health, tourism, media, small business, and hospitality professionals contributed information to the project, which was funded by Florida’s Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Fish and Wildlife Research Institute.

The project was undertaken in response to priorities identified by the Florida HAB Task Force. Documents include a summary report with major findings from four project components: annotated bibliography, usability studies, focus groups, and a public survey instrument; and nine detailed reports about individual project elements.

The project developed a better social science understanding of preferred red tide information, formats, and sources, and a structure for aligning the flow and timing of that information.

SeaGrant’s newly funded NOAA Harmful Algal Bloom Liaison project, undertaken with NOAA’s CoastWatch, is expanding HAB training across the SeaGrant network and partnerships. It is seeking input on a survey that will be used to help develop a HAB-specific training module for applying satellite observations to HABs.

The training and data needs assessment survey will help support user training classes on satellite products and will support work with partners to customize products for specific regions. (Individual survey responses will not be made public.)

The National HAB Observing Network hosted its first webinar — which provided an overview of the new network — on Sept. 1 with Dr. Greg Doucette, NOAA NCCOS.

Researchers have completed a comprehensive online map of the world’s coral reefs — including reefs in the Gulf of Mexico — by using more than 2 million satellite images from across the globe, the Associated Press reports.

The Allen Coral Atlas, named after late Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, will act as a reference for reef conservation, marine planning and coral science as researchers try to save these fragile ecosystems that are being lost to climate change.

The Atlas maps corals in up to 50 feet of water — so it does not include reefs in the mesophotic zone, particularly Pulley Ridge or the Flower Garden Banks.

We continue to track gliders in the Gulf on GANDALF, our glider-tracking dashboard. Follow along with the University of South Florida and U.S. Navy gliders in the Gulf; we’re also tracking a wave glider.

We’ve received six additional gliders to deploy this hurricane season thanks to an IOOS/Navy collaboration. We're hoping for a suitable sea state that will allow us to deploy five of them in the western Gulf, west of the Loop Current between Texas and Louisiana. A TAMU glider will be deployed near the Loop Current and cyclonic eddies and we're hoping to deploy an additional Navy glider from Gulfport and have it travel down through the Florida Straits and up through Charleston.

The Hurricane Picket Line gliders running during hurricane season are designed to collect information from areas where tropical storms and hurricanes typically form or strengthen and are playing an important role in hurricane intensity forecasting. As Hurricane Ida tracked through the Gulf, data from Navy Glider NG645 were assimilated into the RTOFS, and helped nudge the model to capture a salinity barrier layer, which affects hurricane intensity. The storm tracked along the warmest axis of the extended Loop Current, then crossed the shelf where there is a salinity barrier layer and very warm waters from surface to bottom.

Did you miss the last webinar hosted by the Underwater User Glider Group (UG2)? Are you looking for information about an upcoming webinar or workshop? Are you hoping to connect to other glider operators? Don’t forget that there’s a one-stop website for all your glider needs!

CO-OPS and Gulf of Mexico Partners have expanded the Mobile Bay Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS®), improving the safety of marine navigation in the Alabama waterway. A new visibility sensor was installed in the middle of the bay near the entrance to Theodore Ship Channel, the third in the Mobile Bay system. An existing current meter was also relocated near the mouth of the Mobile River to better capture currents at the Mobile Harbor turning basin. This sensor supplements a current meter at the Three Mile Creek turning basin that has received overwhelmingly positive feedback from harbor pilots and the U.S. Navy in the region. These enhancements help mariners coming in and out of port navigate safely, protecting life and property and keeping commerce moving smoothly in the Port of Mobile.

As part of the ongoing UN Ocean Decade, Ocean Obs19 hosted a satellite session yesterday highlighting a three-step approach that developers can use to create tailored data products to help inform decision making among coastal communities. “A Predicted Ocean” Laboratory — Satellite Event — Engaging Stakeholders in Decade Programmes included GCOOS Senior Advisor Dr. Barbara Kirkpatrick, who led a breakout session, and Research Specialist Bob Currier, who led a lightning talk on developing a glider piloting dashboard for pilots and data users.

The Coastal Salinity Index (CSI) is a long-term monitoring tool developed in 2017 through a partnership of the U.S. Geological Survey and National Integrated Drought Information System to help users characterize and assess fluctuating salinity conditions in coastal areas due to events such as drought and floods.

Funding provided from the USGS Community for Data Integration in 2020 allowed the CSI team to expand this real-time network to 103 gages located from Maine to Texas and Puerto Rico, by including additional real-time salinity gauges from the USGS, Everglades National Park, and the National Estuarine Research Reserve System.

The index can be used for different estuary types (for example: brackish, oligohaline, or mesohaline), for regional comparison between estuaries, and as an index of wet conditions (high freshwater inflow) in addition to drought (saline) conditions.

You can learn more about the CSI and its expansion in an October webinar.

The Gulf Research Program is hosting a webinar later this month focused on the future of the mighty Mississippi. “Understanding the Future of the Mississippi River Delta: Learning from the Changing Course Design Competition,” will give an overview of the 2014-2015 competition “Changing Course” and its results, including key takeaways from members of the design teams.

The competition asked design teams to undertake an exercise to create innovative — and implementable — solutions to restoring and sustaining the Lower Mississippi River Delta over the next hundred years. In an effort to inform scientists, engineers, and planners, GRP is hosting a webinar to inform both the Program and others of the lessons learned and discuss the questions that remain.

The National Academies is hosting a free two-day workshop focused on the impacts climate change has on communities experiencing health disparities and environmental injustice. The two-day virtual workshop will bring together people with lived experience, environmental health experts, resilience practitioners, and climate scientists.

As Hurricane Ida made landfall as a category 4 storm, the Coastal Data Information Program (CDIP) recorded some impressive data. CDIP thanked partners at LUMCON, Mote Marine Laboratory, and the University of South Florida for outstanding collaboration to keep the array instrumented.

The Center for Ocean Mapping and Innovative Technologies (COMIT) at the University of South Florida is hosting a webinar focused on water levels and coastal changes. “Forecasting Total Water Levels and Coastal Change Hazards,” will be presented by Dr. Meg Palmsten, Research Oceanographer with the United States Geological Survey’s St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center.

The Hurricane Ecosystem Response Synthesis — Research Coordination Network (HERS RCN) is hosting a kick-off webinar later this month.

The Network is an international collaborative effort funded by the National Science Foundation that is dedicated to connecting natural scientists, economists, sociologists, statisticians, modelers, and resource managers to work together to develop a global understanding for what governs ecosystem responses to tropical cyclones. Additionally, HERS aims to share and synthesize a growing, publicly available database on ecosystem responses to tropical cyclones as part of its core effort.

The webinar will explore three focal interests:

The NOAA RESTORE Science Program has awarded $2.3 million to 20 project teams in the Gulf of Mexico to collaboratively scope and design research that will inform future decisions on how to manage natural resources, including marine mammals, shorebirds, barrier islands, and fisheries. Each project, slated to begin this month, is designed to be an investment in the future of applied science, and ultimately, the sustainability of the Gulf of Mexico ecosystem.

NOAA Administrator and Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, Dr. Richard Spinrad, recently announced the recipients of the 2021 Bronze Medal and Distinguished Career Awards, and employees who have reached the 50-year milestone in their Federal careers. The honorees will be recognized at a virtual ceremony this fall.

While we can’t recognize all of our Gulf colleagues who were recognized here, we wanted to offer congratulations to all of them for their outstanding achievements!

GOMA Team Mid-Year Meetings scheduled for Sept. 21-23 have moved to a virtual-only format. If you’ve already registered to attend in person you will automatically be transferred to a virtual registration.

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

21-23: GOMA Team Mid-Year meetings, Virtual

20-23: Global Oceans 2021

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

19-21: 5th Annual Environmental DNA Technical Exchange Workshop virtual

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. Jorge Brenner, Executive Director • Dr. Barbara Kirkpatrick, Senior Advisor • 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