Alaska
Real-time forecast muscle, provided by two new just-deployed weather data
buoys,
will help local forecasters more effectively track storms just off the
Alaskan coastline. Richard Przywarty, the Alaskan region weather service
director, says that storms of hurricane intensity commonly put fishermen
and coastal communities at great risk from late fall to early winter.
Calling the new buoys “eyes on the water,” he explains that
the new buoys will help lower this risk. They are the first two of seven
that, under a joint NOAA/Coast Guard Alaska Initiative will deploy by
2003.
Equipped
with sophisticated sensors, the new buoys will provide weather forecasters
with real-time observations of temperature, humidity and barometric
pressure, wind speed, wind direction and wave lengths. The public can
access these same observations through NOAA Weather Radio and Marine
Radio from Alaska’s weather service offices, among other resources.
For more
about data buoys: http://www.ndbc.noaa.gov
To visit
the Alaska Regional Weather Service Office:
http://www.alaska.net/~nwsar/
Central America
In the wake of Hurricane Mitch, the 1998 killer storm that took 11,000
lives, weather forecasting in Central America is getting a boost from
NOAA environmental satellite high-resolution imagery and data. As part
of a multi-national effort, the data will strengthen weather forecasts
throughout the region. From a satellite ground station Costa Rico, high
resolution imagery from NOAA’s Geostationary Operational Environmental
Satellites (GOES) will enable regional weather forecasters to analyze
data that will distributed to meteorological services in Belize, El
Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua and Panama.
National
meteorological offices will be equipped with special computers that,
with new data available every 30 minutes, will allow them to detect
hurricanes, heavy precipitation, wildland fires, and volcanic ash and
cloud movement. Through NESDIS, the nation’s primary source of
space-based meteorological and climate data, the new system builds on
NOAA’s existing partnership with other nations in the Atlanrtic,
Caribbean and Central American region.
For a project
overview: http://www.cira.colostate.edu/RAMM/MitchProject/default.htm
NOAA GOES home page: http://www.oso.noaa.gov/goes/
Florida
Protection
for the Florida Keys got a recent boost when the National Ocean Service
received initial approval for an international measure advancing existing
safeguards. The measure is aimed at reducing harm from international
shipping activity to fragile coral reefs, seagrass meadows and mangrove
forests. With about 40 percent of international commerce passing within
a day and a half sailing time of Key West, the waters surrounding the
Florida Keys and Tortugas are among the world’s most heavily trafficked
shipping areas. Through grounding, anchoring, collisions and discharge
of harmful substances, the world coral reefs, already at major risk
of being lost, are placed at even greater risk. In just seconds, anchoring
activity can wipe out thousands of years of growth.
One behalf
of NOAA and the State of Florida, the U.S. presented a proposal to the
International Maritime organization to designate the marine area around
the Keys a “particularly sensitive area.” This means the Keys’
coral reef ecosystem would be the third area in the world selected for
this designation. Encompassing all of the Florida Keys National Marine
Sanctuary, it would join Australia’s Great Barrier Reef and the
Sabana-Camaguey Archipelago in Cuba.
Tour the
Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary: http://www.fknms.nos.noaa.gov/
Olympic
Coast
…And along the Olympic Coast, NOAA and the Coast Guard just gained
preliminary approval to protect the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary’s
sensitive resources. A proposal heard by the International Maritime
Organization would move large commercial ships further ashore, reducing
the threat of a devastating oil spill on this ecological treasure.
The two-part
proposal reflects existing traffic vessel patterns and oil spill risk
studies. It increases the “area-to-be-avoided,” providing
a greater margin of safety around navigational hazards; and it would
apply to ships greater than 1600 gross tons, regardless of their cargo.
Vessels engaged in fishing and other sanctuary activities would not
be affected. Situated within the sanctuary, the entrance to the Strait
of Juan de Fuca is one of the West Coast’s busiest intersections.
Visit the sanctuary at: http://www.sanctuaries.nos.noaa.gov/oms/omsolympic/omsolympic.html
Proposal: http://www.ocnms.nos.noaa.gov/pubdocs/pars.html
The Olympic
Coast National Marine Sanctuary covers over 3300 square miles of ocean
waters off Washington State's rugged
Olympic Peninsula coastline. Larger than Delaware and Rhode Island combined,
the sanctuary is full of biological superlatives. More species of whales,
dolphins, and porpoises spend time in these waters and more kinds of
kelp are found here than anywhere else in the world.
The sanctuary
is home to large populations of many seabird species such as the common
murre.
Rock
carvings on Olympic coast seaside boulders link early Native American
inhabitants of the region and denizens of the ocean.
Idaho
StormReady
and officially recognized by NWS, 10 Idaho counties and 39 cities were
cited during the Idaho Governor’s Conference for Emergency Management.
The StormReady designation recognized team effort and the dedicated
work of local emergency managers in helping their communities to guard
against severe weather.
Greg Mandt,
head of the National Weather Service’s Office of Climate, Water
and Weather Services, said the communities have demonstrated a strong
commitment to putting the infrastructure and systems in place to save
lives and protect property. StormReady road signs will inform residents
and travelers that they are in an NWS-certified community.
Nationally,
171 communities are now StormReady. Idaho leads the way with 49. Begun
in 1999 as a pilot program in Tulsa, this top National Weather Service
initiative added 129 communities just this year.
http://www.stormready.noaa.gov
