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NOAA
Restoration Day in Virginia
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| More
than 50 NOAA employees, state partners, and local high school
students participated in the first annual NOAA Restoration
Day in Virginia last month, co-sponsored by the NOAA Chesapeake
Bay office in Virginia and the NOAA Restoration Center. The
event gave NOAA employees in the lower Chesapeake Bay an opportunity
to restore portions of Virginia Commonwealth University's
Inger and Walter Rice Center for Environmental Life Studies
in Charles City, Va., a 342-acre "living laboratory"
for the University's undergraduate and graduate students which
borders the James River. During Restoration Day, volunteers
planted underwater grass in the river — grass they had
grown in their offices and classrooms. Participants also built
and installed more than two dozen nesting boxes for migratory
prothonotary warblers, removed more than 750 pounds of marine
debris from the James River shoreline, and educated participants
on collecting and understanding water quality data.
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NOAA
employees, state partners, and local high school students
planted underwater grasses they had grown in their offices
and classroom as part of NOAA Restoration Day on Virginia’s
James River. |
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NOAA
Donates Katrina Artifacts to Smithsonian
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| Replicas
of tools used by NOAA’s forecasters during Hurricane
Katrina have joined artifacts from the September 11th terrorist
attacks in the Smithsonian Institution’s collection
of items from a significant national event.
Included
in the donation to the National Museum of American History
in Washington is a dropwindsonde, identical to those dropped
into Katrina by NOAA aircraft; an exact replica of the Katrina
tracking chart used by NHC hurricane forecasters; an enlargement
of the Urgent Weather Message issued on August 28th by lead
forecaster Robert Ricks at the Slidell,
La., weather forecast office, and the personal rosary he used
during Katrina with a personally written narrative of its
significance. The artifacts will eventually be placed into
exhibits on presidents or a timeline of major events in the
United States.
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National
Weather Service director David L. Johnson
holds a replica of the tracking chart used by National
Hurricane Center forecasters over the span of Hurricane
Katrina. At right is Dr. Brent Glass,
director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum
of American History.
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Employee and Team Member of the Month
for June
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| Employee of the Month
Marty
Welch
NOS
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Team Member of the Month
Willow
Marr
PPI
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NOAA’s
Employee and Team Member of the Month for June are
NOS’s Marty Welch
and PPI’s Willow Marr.
Marty manages CO-OPS' rapidly expanding
partnership effort in support of field operations.
He led the CO-OPS activity to establish a purchase
order/task contract with seven well qualified oceanographic
companies who now compete for CO-OPS field support
tasks. In less than a year, CO-OPS has executed 12
project tasks that support NOAA mission critical activities
that vary from the installation of new water level
stations in support of tsunami warning, investigation
of new measurement sites to meet NWS storm surge and
IOOS requirements, the acquisition of new current
measurements in southeastern Alaska and the Hudson
River to enhance NOAA's Tidal Current Prediction tables,
to the ongoing operation and maintenance of stations
included in the National Water Level Observation Network.
Marty ensures the effective use of the private industry
in supporting NOAA responsibilities. His skill and
perseverance allow CO-OPS to respond to rapidly expanding
customer requirements.
Willow
Marr was instrumental in managing the approval and
issuance of NOAA's Transition of Research to Application
Policy's implementation procedures. These procedures
establish NOAA's process for transitioning research
to application and/or operation and are used by line
office and goal teams. In addition, she documented
the major changes to NOAA's planning phase of the
Planning, Programming, Budgeting and Execution System,
updated NOAA's Business Operations Manual to reflect
the new procedures, and assisted in drafting a Program
Rating Assessment Tool handbook for use by OMB selected
programs. Her attention to detail and get-it-done
attitude has a positive effect on all of NOAA.
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Penguins
donned their tuxedos and turtles came out of their shells
during Take Your Children to Work Day earlier this spring
at the NOAA library in Silver Spring. Nearly 150 children
participated in eight activities, including arts and crafts,
live turtles, and penguin games.
The
NOAA Central Library was the center of activity for 146 registered
young children during Bring Your Children to Work Day. Eight
workshops, staffed by 22 volunteers, all included the theme
“Turtles and Penguins.” NOAA librarians, volunteers
and parents staffed the Story Time couch and read to eager
youngsters. Employees from NOAA’s offices of safety
and security also gave the kids and their parents tips on
how to handle emergencies, how to prevent poisoning at home,
and how to stay safe on their bicycles.
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Kids
take over the NOAA library in Silver Spring on Take
Your Children to Work Day. |
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“Pulse
of the Planet” Part of 2006 Intel Awards
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| NOAA
presented special awards to three students whose outstanding
projects were judged to further understanding of Earth’s
systems as part of the 2006 Intel International Science and
Engineering Fair. The awards, entitled “Taking the Pulse
of the Planet,” were sponsored by the NOAA Office of
Education and designed to recognize the importance of the
U.S.-led initiative to develop a global Earth Observation
System.
The
fair is the preeminent science fair for pre-college students
from around the world. Student finalists have gone through
a rigorous competition and have won an all-expense paid trip
to the event. The 2006 recipients, all high school juniors,
were Alexa A. Carey, Gold Beach
High School, Gold Beach, Ore.; John Christopher
Turner, Lincoln High School, Tallahassee, Fla.;
and Malcolm Bruce Young, Centraurus
High School, Lafayette, Colo.
The
judging team for the NOAA awards consisted of George
Sharman from the National Geophysical Data Center,
Margaret McCalla from the Office
of the Federal Coordinator for Meteorology, and Steve
Gittings from NOAA’s National Marine Sanctuary
Program. Sharman has over 30 years of experience with science
fairs and served as the chair of the team.
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| George
Sharman, chair of the NOAA judging team, stands
with the three winners of the “Taking the Pulse
of the Planet” Awards. |
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Making
Its Telepresence Known
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| NOAA’s
Office of Ocean Exploration brought the concept of telepresence
home to more than 6,500 visitors at the Aquarium of the Pacific
in Long Beach, Calif., during the aquarium's Technology Day.
As
part of its exhibit of “telepresence," exploring
the oceans by remote camera, NOAA showed live underwater images
from Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, north on the
California coast, and explained how telepresence capability
will be built in to the new ship Okeanos Explorer
and stations ashore. Teachers attending the exhibit received
3D images of the Hercules remotely operated vehicle, which
NOAA uses to study and recover artifacts from ancient shipwrecks,
and study biology and geology in the deep sea.
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A
NOAA exhibit on telepresence was one of the highlights
of Technology Day at the Aquarium of the Pacific in
Long Beach, Calif. Here, children use 3D glasses to
see images of the underwater robot Hercules at work. |
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At AccessNOAA,
we’re always looking for interesting stories about NOAA
people just like you. Whether your office has received an
award, or your collection of Elvis memorabilia is tops in
its class, if it makes a fellow NOAA reader take a second
look, it’s right for AccessNOAA. E-mail your stories
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