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Photo by Diane Knaus Baltimore, Maryland Site Index 1. Health News 2. This Page 5. Hotlines 9. Advertisers 10. The Ozone 11. FEMA 16. NASA info 17. Politico 18. AIDS Info 19. Marriage 21. U.N. Info 23. Pet Gallery 24. Natural Portraits New Photos 25. Pride Gallery A 27. This Page 28. Other News 29. Hurricane Katrina Help url's 30. Help 32. Int'l Car Show Auto & News New Photos 34. Pride Gallery B 36. Travel Photos Diane Knaus New Photos
NOAA Deploys Third Smart Buoy in The Chesapeake The NOAA Chesapeake Bay Office deployed its third smart buoy as part of the Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail the nations first water-based National Historic Trail. The buoy is positioned at the mouth of the Patapsco River, near Baltimore, Md., and is the third observation platform to be launched this summer as part of the Chesapeake Bay Interpretive Buoy System. The Chesapeake Bay
is a national treasure. This smart buoy uses innovative science and
technology to help us learn more about the health of the bay through
time, said U.S. Senator Barbara Mikulski. Im so
proud of the Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail
for working to preserve the bay for future generations. I will continue
to fight for new technologies to protect and restore the bay. The buoys collect meteorological and water-quality data as well as information on waves and currents, via a system of sensors, which then transmit the information to the Web in real time via a high-speed data network. These measurements, as well as historical and cultural information about the bay, can be accessed over the Internet at http://www.buoybay.org/site/public/ and by phone at (877) BUOY-BAY (286-9229).
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NOAA Weather Warnings Governor Beebe Declares
Seven Counties Disaster Areas Due To Tornado And Thunderstorm Damage LITTLE ROCK Governor Mike Beebe has declared Benton, Cleburne, Conway, Grant, Pulaski, Saline and Van Buren Counties state disaster areas due to the damage caused by powerful tornadoes and violent thunderstorms on Friday, May 2. More counties will be added to this list as preliminary damage assessments are done in other counties. The Arkansas Department of
Emergency Management will work in the coming days to establish locations
for Disaster Recovery Centers in the declared counties. Early this evening,
Governor Beebe spoke with President George W. Bush about the storms
and ADEM Director David Maxwell has spoken with Federal Emergency Management
Agency Director David Paulison. Both conversations indicated there would
be continued swift federal response to Arkansas's latest round of natural
disasters. Governor Beebe previously declared 59 Arkansas counties disaster areas following storms and floods in the late winter and early spring. While federal assistance continues for those disasters, most of those state declarations have expired. The seven counties declared tonight begin a new set of declarations. Myanmar Typhoon May 1, 2008 Myanmar Typhoon disaster -thousands of people missing as cities and properties are destroyed. Little hope of outside countries ability to help as country has been run by their repressive military for years. In video clips men were cuting large trees with matchettes, not the best tool for such a big job. IF YOU MUST TRAVEL...KEEP AN EXTRA FLASHLIGHT...FOOD... AND WATER IN YOUR VEHICLE IN CASE OF AN EMERGENCY. Groud Level Ozone Daily Forecasts Ground-level ozone forecasts, for years a key predictor of air quality in major U.S. cities, are now available throughout the contiguous United States. NOAAs National Weather Service, in partnership with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, has extended its operational ozone forecast guidance to 11 western states and expanded the service in six other states, ensuring that the most populous cities throughout the country will have access to the information on a daily basis. "Poor air quality is
a silent killer, responsible for tens of thousands of premature deaths
each year in the continental United States," said Jack Hayes, Ph.D.,
director of NOAA's National Weather Service. "Weather and air quality
are strongly linked. Temperature and lack of wind can create and trap
harmful ozone where we work and play. Our ozone forecasts will enable
city and state air quality managers to look ahead, see trouble brewing,
and issue next-day alerts for poor air quality." NOAAs expanded forecasting
guidance gives state and local agencies another important tool for bringing
air quality information directly to citizens, said Bob Meyers,
EPAs principal deputy assistant administrator for air and radiation.
Air quality forecasts help Americans across the country reduce
their exposure to pollution and lead healthier lives." States added to the expanded
ozone forecast area are Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana,
Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming, and the western
portions of Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota and
Texas. Established in 2004 in several
northeastern states, the program to predict air quality has been built
by a team of NOAA and EPA scientists who develop, test and implement
improvements in the science of air quality forecasting for real-time
predictions. National Weather Services weather forecast models
drive simulations of atmospheric chemical conditions using pollutant
emissions and monitoring data provided by EPA. Twice daily, supercomputers
operated by NOAAs National Centers for Environmental Prediction
produce ground-level ozone forecasts, which are available on National
Weather Service and EPA data servers. NOAA, an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce, is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of the nation's coastal and marine resources. Through the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), NOAA is working with its federal partners, more than 70 countries and the European Commission to develop a global network that is as integrated as the planet it observes, predicts and protects. Harmful Algal Blooms Increasing in U.S. "Harmful algal blooms are very complex phenomena that cause serious economic harm. This report provides an important overview of the current status of efforts to respond to harmful algal blooms in our coastal and inland waters and is the first step in developing a national plan to improve those efforts," said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. The report, National Assessment of Efforts to Predict and Respond to Harmful Algal Blooms in U.S. Waters, also known as the Prediction and Response Report, assesses the harmful algal bloom problem in U.S. waters and identifies progress made since 2000 by federal agencies in prevention, control, and mitigation of harmful algal blooms in the U.S. The study reports that the
frequency of harmful algal bloom events is increasing and their geographical
distribution now impacts all the coastal states. Freshwater harmful
algal blooms are an increasing problem in inland states as well. Human
activities such as nutrient pollution are thought to contribute to some
of these increases. Harmful algal blooms may produce toxins and/ or develop excess biomass that negatively impact humans and ecosystems. Humans, domestic animals, and wildlife can be exposed to algal toxins through their food, drinking water, the water in which they swim, and the air near the water, resulting in fish kills, mortality of protected species, and human illness and potentially even death. High biomass blooms can discolor the water, impart foul odors and tastes to drinking water, accumulate in large quantities on beaches, overgrow coral reefs, shade aquatic plants, and upon death, deplete the water of oxygen. Newly developed technologies can be used for rapid toxin detection in the field and others can be deployed for automated, real-time detection of events. Some have potential for use as official methods for regulatory purposes and others can be used to assess toxin exposure in humans and in marine mammals and birds. Satellite and automated underwater vehicle tracking of bloom events coupled with transport models has helped coastal managers predict bloom movement for more effective management. Federal response to events has also improved significantly.
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Tell the people in your life how much you love them every day. All weather information is from NOAA information, and CBC.ca 911 Salmon Secretary of Commerce Carlos
M. Gutierrez today declared a commercial fishery failure for the West
Coast salmon fishery due to historically low salmon returns. Also today,
NOAAs Fisheries Service issued regulations to close or severely
limit recreational and commercial salmon fishing in the area. Hundreds of thousands of fall
Chinook salmon typically return to the Sacramento River every year to
spawn. This year, scientists estimate that fewer than 60,000 adult Chinook
will make it back to the Sacramento River. This is far below what is
needed to sustain the population and we have decided to shut down the
commercial ocean salmon fishery for all of California and most of Oregon
to aid their recovery, said Jim Balsiger, NOAAs Fisheries
Service acting assistant administrator. Its a tough decision,
but the condition of the salmon fishery forces us to close most of it
to ensure healthy runs of this valuable fish in the future. Although the reasons for the
sudden decline of the fishery are not completely understood, NOAA scientists
suggest that changes in ocean conditions, including unfavorable shifts
in ocean temperature and food sources for juvenile salmon, likely caused
poor survival of salmon that would have comprised this years fishery.
Loss of freshwater habitat for salmon spawning, rearing, and migration
to the ocean is a chronic problem that has made salmon populations more
susceptible to the occasional poor ocean conditions. NOAA will undertake
a thorough examination of the causes. Coho salmon stocks off Washington
and northern Oregon, while in slightly better shape, are still far below
normal, and there will be substantially curtailed commercial fishing
off those areas as well. A small recreational fishery off Oregons
northern coast and targeted on hatchery-produced coho salmon will be
allowed. The disaster declaration opens
the door for Congress to appropriate money towards alleviating the financial
hardship caused by the fishery disaster. Under Section 312(a) of the Magnuson-Stevens Act, the Commerce Secretary can declare a commercial fishery failure if requested to do so by a governor, or at the Secretary's discretion. The Secretary must determine that the commercial fishery failure resulted from a fishery resource disaster due to natural causes, man-made causes beyond the control of fishery managers, or undetermined causes. NOAA and Awards for Low oxygen Study NOAA has awarded first-year funding of $284,000 to researchers at the University of Texas at Austin Marine Science Institute (UTMSI) as part of a three-year $781,000 project to develop a better understanding of how nutrient pollution from the Mississippi River affects the large area of low oxygen water called the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. The project will also look at how the dead zone affects commercially and recreationally important fish and shellfish. Funds were awarded through
NOAAs Northern Gulf of Mexico Hypoxia and Ecosystems Research
Program. This project will provide
data to verify water quality models and help resource managers determine
the quantitative relationships between nutrient pollution and development,
magnitude, longevity, and distribution of the dead zone. Findings will
also support the development of more accurate predictive models of hypoxia
development on the Louisiana continental shelf. The dead zone is an area in
the Gulf of Mexico where seasonal oxygen levels drop too low to support
most life in bottom and near-bottom waters. It is caused by a seasonal
change where algal growth, stimulated by input of nutrients such as
nitrogen and phosphorus from the Mississippi and Atchafalaya rivers,
settles and decays in the bottom waters. The decaying algae consume
oxygen faster than it can be replenished from the surface, leading to
decreased levels of dissolved oxygen. This past summer off the coast
of Louisiana and Texas, an area of deep water covering 7,900 square
miles was declared hypoxic. It is the third largest Gulf of Mexico dead
zone on record since measurements began in 1985, and represents an area
approximately the size of the state of New Jersey. Also, it is more
than one and a half times the average annual dead zone area measured
since 1990, 4,800 square miles. The largest dead zone ever recorded
covered 8,494 square miles in 2002. The research program, managed
by NOAAs Center for Sponsored Coastal Ocean Research, seeks to
provide resource managers with new tools, techniques, and information
to make informed decisions, and assess alternative management strategies
regarding hypoxia. Supported projects are leading to the development
of a fundamental understanding of the northern Gulf of Mexico ecosystem,
with a focus on the causes and effects of the hypoxic zone, and the
prediction of its future extent and impacts on ecologically and commercially
important living resources. In fiscal year 2007, the NOAA
National Ocean Service, through the center, provided approximately $10
million in competitive grants to institutions of higher education, state,
local and tribal governments, and other non-profit research institutions
to assist NOAA in fulfilling its mission to study our coastal oceans. NOAA COAST SURVEY CONTINUES SEA FLOOR MAPPING EXPEDITION IN THE ARCTIC NOAAs Office of Coast Survey, in partnership with the University of New Hampshires Joint Hydrographic Center and the National Science Foundation, will embark on a four-week cruise to map a portion of the Arctic sea floor starting Aug. 17. This is the third expedition in a series of cruises aboard the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter HEALY designed to map the sea floor on the northern Chukchi Cap. Scientists will explore this poorly known region to better understand its morphology and the potential for including this area within the United States extended continental shelf under the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). The data collected during
this cruise will also provide valuable information for better understanding
sea floor processes and fisheries habitat, as well as provide input
into climate and circulation models that will help scientists predict
future conditions in the Arctic. Previous mapping cruises in
this series were conducted in 2003 and 2004. Flood Dangers Be cautious at night when
it is harder to recognize flood dangers. Q: What is flood insurance? Q: Why do I need flood insurance? Q: How do I obtain a flood
insurance policy? Q: Who can purchase flood
insurance?
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