24-28 May 2010

DataStreme Ocean will return for Fall 2010 with new Investigations files starting during Preview Week, Monday, 30 August 2010. All the current online website products will continue to be available throughout the summer break period.

• North American Safe Boating Week -- This week of 22-28 May has been declared 2010 National Safe Boating Week, to help kick off the 2010 North American Safe Boating Campaign. Check the Safe Boating Week site maintained by the Safe Boating Council.
• Hurricane awareness week -- Since 2010 hurricane season in the eastern North Pacific Ocean basin began on Saturday, 15 May 2010 and the corresponding hurricane season in the North Atlantic basin (including the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico) will begin on 1 June, NOAA has declared the week of 23-29 May 2010 to be Hurricane Awareness Week across the nation.

• Eye on the Tropics -- Two tropical cyclones developed last week over the waters of the North Indian Ocean.
  The first tropical cyclone of the year, Tropical Cyclone Laila formed at the start of last week over the Bay of Bengal and traveled to the northwest, making landfall along the southeast Indian coast by late in the week. This tropical cyclone, which was a weak category 1 cyclone on the Saffir-Simpson Scale brought high seas, strong winds and torrential rains to the coast. After landfall, this cyclone weakened, with remnants moving to the northeast toward Bangladesh. As of last Friday, as many as 23 people had died in southeastern India as Cyclone Laila made landfall near Bapatla, India, which is approximately 250 miles southeast of Hyderabad. [USA Today] Satellite imagery and additional information on Tropical Storm Laila can be obtained from the NASA Hurricane Page.
  The second tropical cyclone of the week was Tropical Storm Bandu (also known as Tropical Storm 2A), which formed off Somalia and the Horn of Africa early last week. By late in the week, it had weakened after moving westward into the Gulf of Aden. For more information and satellite imagery involving Tropical Storm Bandu, consult the NASA Hurricane Page.
• Outlook issued for the Central Pacific hurricane season -- Last week, forecasters at NOAA's Central Pacific Hurricane Center in Honolulu, HI, announced that their outlook for the 2010 Central North Pacific hurricane season, which commences in one week, would have below normal activity. They called for two to three tropical cyclones to develop in the central North Pacific (between longitude 140 degrees west and the International Dateline) during the 2010 season, compared with an average season that would have four or five tropical cyclones, including tropical depressions, tropical storms and hurricanes. Collaborating with their colleagues at NOAA's Climate Prediction Center, they reached this outlook from projected climate conditions for the central North Pacific that involved a continuation of low tropical cyclone activity across the region and to an anticipated conditions that were deemed either ENSO-neutral or La Niña-like. The forecasters at the Central Pacific Hurricane Center also stated that this years message was Prepare, Watch, and Act! [NOAA Central Pacific Hurricane Center]
• Assessing the ocean's growing heat storage -- After analyzing approximately 16 years of ocean temperature data from expendable bathythermographs (XBTs) and autonomous Argo floats, researchers at NOAA, NASA, the UK Met Office Hadley Centre, Germany's University of Hamburg and Japan's Meteorological Research Institute have found that the near surface waters of the oceans have warmed, resulting in a climate imbalance. They calculated that the upper 2000 feet of the world's oceans have stored enough energy since 1993 to power nearly 500 100-Watt light bulbs for each of the nearly 6.7 billion inhabitants of the planet. [NOAA News]
  In another study from the US Environmental Protection Agency, scientists have also found that the amount of heat absorbed by the oceans is approximately ten times the amount of heat absorbed by the atmosphere. These scientists determined that the heat absorbed by the oceans is approximately 10 X 10²² Joules, equivalent to 60 years of electrical energy for the US. [Earthgauge]
• Gulf oil spill updates -- Although efforts have been made to quell the oil spewing into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico off the Louisiana coast from the Deepwater Horizon BP oil spill disaster, considerable amounts of oil continued to reach the surface last week:

• Early last week, NOAA Fisheries Service extended the Fishery Closure Boundary, which delineates the closed fishing area in the Gulf to include the northern portion of the Loop Current, as a precautionary measure to ensure the safety of seafood. As of that time, 81 percent of the Gulf remained open to fishing. [NOAA News]

• NASA scientists at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the Goddard Space Flight Center and Langley Research Center continue to analyze data collected by a variety of instruments on the agency's fleet of Earth orbiting satellites. [NASA] Some the images include those from the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite, the MODIS instruments on the Terra and Aqua satellites and from the CALIOP (Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization) instrument on the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation (CALIPSO) satellite. [NASA JPL] [NASA LaRC] [NASA Earth Observatory]

• French scientists also have been monitoring the progress of the oil slick toward the Loop Current, using surface roughness and current flow data collected by the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) onboard the European Space Agency's Envisat satellite. [ESA]

• Early last week, as many as 20 tar balls were found off Key West, FL, but the US Coast Guard was hesitant to say if those tar balls came from the major oil spill along the Louisiana coast. [CBS News]
• With the approach of the North Atlantic hurricane season, weather forecasters, scientists and Gulf Coast residents are raising concerns that a major tropical storm or hurricane could worsen the effects of the oil spill. Some scientists at NOAA say that multiple tropical cyclones in the Gulf could bring more oil to the surface of the Gulf and storm surges would push this oil onshore or spread the oil to the Florida Strait where the Gulf Stream could carry the oil northward to North Carolina's Outer Banks. [USA Today]

• Review of global weather and climate for April 2010 -- Using the combined global land and ocean surface temperature from preliminary weather data, scientists at NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center have determined that April 2010 was the warmest April since global climate records began in 1880. Furthermore, the average global ocean surface temperature was also the highest since 1880, while the global land surface temperature was third highest on record. Since sea-surface temperature anomalies decreased across the equatorial Pacific Ocean, the El Niño event appeared to weaken in April. The areal coverage of Arctic sea ice remained below the 1979-2000 average and represented the fifteenth lowest April extent since satellite surveillance began in 1979. On the other hand, the extent of Antarctic sea ice was near average.
  The North American snow cover was the smallest for any April since records started in the late 1960s. [NOAA News]
  See also [NOAA Global State of the Climate] for additional information.

• Another observing system deployed for mariners in Texas -- NOAA recently deployed its Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS®) on the Sabine-Neches Waterway of Beaumont and Port Arthur, TX; this NOAA ocean observing system with numerous sensors along the waterway will provide the public and mariners with nearly real-time oceanographic observations of tides, currents and water temperature and meteorological observations of air temperature, barometric pressure and winds (speed, gusts and direction). [NOAA News]

• Tracking groundwater pollution from septic systems to the sea -- Stanford University researchers have been tracking a plume of polluted groundwater from a septic system to Stinson Beach, one of Northern California's top recreational beaches. [Stanford University]
• Western Mediterranean is becoming warmer and saltier -- Researchers at the Oceanic Centre of Malaga of the Spanish Institute of Oceanography have determined that temperature and salt levels of the deep water in the Western Mediterranean Sea have increased between 1943 and 2000, with the last decade experiencing accelerated increases. [EurekAlert!]
• An updated determination of ocean depth and volume is made -- Using data collected from satellites and from sonar depth finders, scientists with Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service recently released the results of their revised calculations of the volume and depth of the world's oceans, claiming that the ocean volume is 1.332 billion cubic kilometers and the mean depth is 3682.2 meters. [Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution]
• A call for sustainable fishing is made -- Scientists from three of Europe’s leading marine organizations, the Marine Board-European Science Foundation, the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and the European Fisheries and Aquaculture Research Organisation produced a position paper, "Science dimensions of an Ecosystem Approach to Management of Biotic Ocean Resources" that called for the development of a better understanding of the links between changes in marine ecosystems, human use and human well-being in an effort to develop and manage sustainable fishing that would permit continued use of the oceans as a rich resource. [European Science Foundation] [EurekAlert!]

• Coral reefs off Thailand hit by bleaching -- Marine scientists at Thailand's Phuket Marine Biological Centre report that massive coral bleaching in the Andaman Sea off the southwest coast of Thailand appears to be the worst in 20 years. They point to increased sea temperatures as being the culprit for the bleaching. [Bangkok Post]

• Increased attention to ocean acidification urged -- European and American scientists attending the "Impacts of Ocean Acidification" science policy briefing presented last week by the European Science Foundation emphasized the need for a concerted and integrated international effort to research and monitor the effects of ocean acidification on marine environments and human communities because of increases in carbon dioxide levels caused by increased fossil fuel combustion. [EurekAlert!] [Editor's Note: This briefing was held in conjunction with European Maritime Day 2010, which is celebrated annually 20 May with the aim to raise awareness of the importance of the sea among the European citizens. The European Maritime Day was established jointly by the European Council, the European Parliament and European Commission in 2008 as part of the European Union's (EU) maritime policy. EJH]

• 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, drought, floods, 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, to include drought, floods and storms during the current month. [NCDC]
• Earthweek -- Diary of the Planet [earthweek.com] Requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

• 24 May 1500...The 13 ships in the fleet of Portuguese navigator Pedro Alvares Cabral were hit by a huge ice storm that sank four ships. The rest of the ships were separated as they sailed south of the Cape of Good Hope and continued their journey to India.
• 24 May 1901...The relative humidity at Parkstone, Dorset in England at 4 PM was reported to be 9.5 percent. This low relative humidity is not typical of the British Islands, which are surrounded by ocean water and have no large high mountain barriers or plateaus. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 24 May 1951...Northeast gales generated waves to 15 feet high in the harbor of Newport, RI. A 50-ft. Navy launch with about 142 men on board capsized. Nineteen of the men drowned in the incident. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 24 May 1992...Winds up to 40 knots and seas to 18 feet in the northern Gulf of Alaska, approximately 30 miles southwest of Alaska's Cape Cleare, sent three waves crashing over the Cajun Mama. The 80-ft fishing boat sank, but the crew of five was rescued. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)
• 25 May 1985...The Meghna River delta in Bangladesh was hit with a tropical cyclone with winds of over 100 mph that created a 15-to 20-foot high storm surge that flooded a 400-square-mile area, mainly islands located in the mouth of the river. More than 11,000 people and 500,000 head of cattle died and hundreds of thousands were left homeless because of this cyclone.
• 26 May 1967...A slow moving nor'easter battered New England with high winds, heavy rain, and record late season snow on this day and into the 26th. Winds 70 to 90 mph in gusts occurred along the coast. Over 7 inches of rain fell at Nantucket, MA with 6.57 inches falling in 24 hours to set a new 24-hour rainfall record. Severe damage occurred along the coast from very high tides. The 24.9 inches of snow that fell at Mount Washington, NH set a new May snowfall record. Other locations in New Hampshire received 10 inches of snow near Keene and 6 inches at Dublin. (Intellicast)
• 28 May 1963...A cyclone killed about 22,000 people along the coast of East Pakistan.
• 28 May 1987...A robot probe found the wreckage of the USS Monitor off Cape Hatteras, NC. (Wikipedia)
• 29 May 1827...The first nautical school was opened in Nantucket, MA, under the name Admiral Sir Isaac Coffin's Lancasterian School.
• 29 May 1914...Shallow river fog along the St. Lawrence River approximately 185 miles from Quebec City, Quebec contributed to the collision of the CP Liner Empress of Ireland and a Norwegian coal ship, The Storstad. Although the two ships had spotted each other several minutes before the collision, altered courses and confused signals contributed to the crash. In one of the worst ship disasters in history, the liner sank in 25 minutes drowning 1024 passengers of the 1477 people on board. Only seven lifeboats escaped the rapidly sinking vessel. (The Weather Doctor) (The History Channel)
• 29 May 1950...A Royal Canadian Mounted Police schooner, RCMPV St. Roch, became the first ship to circumnavigate North America, when it arrived in Halifax, Nova Scotia. (Wikipedia)
• 30 May 1767...The first stone of the tower for the Charleston Lighthouse on Morris Island, SC was laid on this date. (USCG Historian's Office)
• 30-31 May 1997...As many as 140 people had to be rescued from rip currents off Dayton Beach Shores, FL. One man died in a rip current while trying to save his wife. (Accord's Weather Guide Calendar)

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Prepared by AMS DS Ocean Central Staff and Edward J. Hopkins, Ph.D., email hopkins@meteor.wisc.edu
ã Copyright, 2010, The American Meteorological Society.