News
Recovery of Pioneer Array in November
On November 9, 2022, a team of 18 scientists and engineers will leave the dock at Woods Hole, MA aboard the R/V Neil Armstrong on an historic expedition. It will be the nineteenth, and last, expedition to the Coastal Pioneer Array on the New England Shelf (NES). This is because the team will be recovering, but not redeploying the NES Pioneer array as in prior years. Designed to be relocatable, the array will be moved to a new location in theSouthern Mid-Atlantic Bight in early 2024. The ocean observing data collected since 2016 at the NES site, about 75 nautical miles south of Martha’s Vineyard, has provided valuable insights into changing ocean conditions at the Atlantic continental shelf and upper slope. The New England Shelf Pioneer data will remain available to the community for continued analysis.
“The Coastal Pioneer Array has been a true workhorse, providing valuable, consistent data from this important intersection in the ocean, where ocean currents meet in weather-like “fronts,” and where heat, salt, nutrients, and other properties are exchanged between the coast and the deep ocean “said Chief Scientist John Lund, who has been on 18 of Pioneer’s 19 expeditions.
“The impacts of the Coastal Pioneer Array have been many,” added Al Plueddemann, Principal Investigator of OOI Coastal and Global Scale Nodes. “To my knowledge, OOI Pioneer is the first sustained, interdisciplinary shelfbreak observatory. Pioneer data have allowed researchers to identify new shelf-slope dynamics and exchange mechanisms and have given us a first glimpse of what appears to be a changing coastal regime. It is very gratifying to see these outcomes, and to recognize the promise of continued findings using the data for years to come.”
[media-caption path="/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/last_NES_CPM_PMUI-17.jpg" link="#"]This Coastal Profiler Mooring, PMUI-17, was the last Pioneer mooring deployed on the New England Shelf. After providing data through the summer and early fall, it will be recovered in November 2022 and relocated to the Southern Mid-Atlantic Bight in 2024. Credit: Al Plueddemann ©WHOI.[/media-caption]
The Pioneer 19 expedition will be conducted in two legs. The Armstrong will leave port with a nearly empty back deck to allow for carrying back the various parts of the array. During the expedition, three coastal surface moorings, five coastal profiler moorings four coastal gliders, and two global test gliders will be recovered. Additionally, Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) operations will be conducted in the vicinity of the moored array, as well as CTD (conductivity, temperature, and depth) casts and water sampling at the mooring, AUV, and glider recovery sites. To take full advantage of the time at sea, comparisons of ship and buoy meteorological measurements at the surface mooring sites will be made.
To carry on the collaborative nature of the Pioneer expeditions, during leg 1, the Pioneer Team will be joined by a marine mammal observer from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a graduate student from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution who will be measuring frontal systems, using the shipboard acoustic doppler current profiler and thermosalinograph. Leg 1 will also include a special deployment of a mini-boat surface drifter for an Educational Passages program. This mini-boat was built by students at Waterford School in Connecticut will coincide with the deployment of a similar boat built by students in Ireland.
Leg 2 will include investigators from the New England Shelf Long Term Ecological Research (NES-LTER) Program, who will be conducting underway sampling, and CTD and zooplankton net casts at LTER sites.
An intern from the Marine Advanced Technology Education (MATE) Center will be onboard during both legs.
“While we are all a bit nostalgic about this being the last journey to the Pioneer Array in this location, we are excited about the new science questions that will be answered by the array in its new location.” said Chief Scientist Lund. “We are proud to have been part of collecting nearly a decade’s worth of measurements, which are being used to better understand coastal processes in general with an emphasis on this important New England ocean region.”
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Call for Lightning Talks at OOIFB Town Hall
The Ocean Observatories Initiative Facilities Board (OOIFB) will host a Town Hall at the 2022 Fall AGU Meeting on December 12th from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm Central Time. The Town Hall will be offered in-person, as well as virtually. The community will have the opportunity to hear the latest information about the OOI Facility Board activities, OOI facility, Pioneer Array relocation plans, and learn about research using OOI data.
The Town Hall will also include a series of lightning presentations where scientists are invited to present one slide in one minute explaining how they have used (or plan to use) freely available observatory data in their respective research. This is your opportunity to highlight your experience with OOI. We hope you will consider presenting a slide in the lightning session.
Time during the Town Hall is limited and we expect to be able to schedule about six lightning talks during the Town Hall. However, all submitted lightning talks will have the opportunity to be presented during the Fall AGU Meeting. The OOIFB has teamed with the OOI booth exhibitor to offer a time slot during the meeting to highlight all of the lightning talks.
Sign-up now to present a lightning talk – If you are using (or plan to use) OOI data and wish to present a lightning talk during the Town Hall, please please apply using the: LIGHTNING TALK FORM by November 21st. From the applications submitted, we will work to select six lightning talks for the Town Hall that can highlight the exciting research that is being done across the entire OOI Facility.
Funding Available for AGU Fall Meeting Registration Fee – Please note, all participants and presenters during the OOIFB Town Hall must be registered for the 2022 AGU Fall Meeting. Funding is available to offset the registration fees for students and early career scientists (ECS) who are presenting a lightning talk. Funding is limited and the first 8 student/ECS applications will be considered for reimbursement. The Lightning Talk application form includes space for requesting registration fee reimbursement.
The workshop is aimed at researchers who are using or are considering using OOI data and/or adding instrumentation to OOI infrastructure and educators at all levels interested in using data from the OOI’s Arrays. We hope to see you at the OOIFB Town Hall!
Event: OOI Facility Board Town Hall
When: Monday, December 12, 2022 from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm Central Time
Lightning Talks: Apply online here: The form will be open until November 21st.
Where: In person at McCormick Place, Room S106a or Virtual Participation.
The Town Hall agenda and additional details are available here.
Read MoreCall for Lightning Talks at OOIFB Town Hall
The Ocean Observatories Initiative Facilities Board (OOIFB) will host a Town Hall at the 2022 Fall AGU Meeting on December 12th from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm Central Time. The Town Hall will be offered in-person, as well as virtually. The community will have the opportunity to hear the latest information about the OOI Facility Board activities, OOI facility, Pioneer Array relocation plans, and learn about research using OOI data.
The Town Hall will also include a series of lightning presentations where scientists are invited to present one slide in one minute explaining how they have used (or plan to use) freely available observatory data in their respective research. This is your opportunity to highlight your experience with OOI. We hope you will consider presenting a slide in the lightning session.
Time during the Town Hall is limited and we expect to be able to schedule about six lightning talks during the Town Hall. However, all submitted lightning talks will have the opportunity to be presented during the Fall AGU Meeting. The OOIFB has teamed with the OOI booth exhibitor to offer a time slot during the meeting to highlight all of the lightning talks.
Sign-up now to present a lightning talk – If you are using (or plan to use) OOI data and wish to present a lightning talk during the Town Hall, please please apply using the: LIGHTNING TALK FORM by November 21st. From the applications submitted, we will work to select six lightning talks for the Town Hall that can highlight the exciting research that is being done across the entire OOI Facility.
Funding Available for AGU Fall Meeting Registration Fee – Please note, all participants and presenters during the OOIFB Town Hall must be registered for the 2022 AGU Fall Meeting. Funding is available to offset the registration fees for students and early career scientists (ECS) who are presenting a lightning talk. Funding is limited and the first 8 student/ECS applications will be considered for reimbursement. The Lightning Talk application form includes space for requesting registration fee reimbursement.
The workshop is aimed at researchers who are using or are considering using OOI data and/or adding instrumentation to OOI infrastructure and educators at all levels interested in using data from the OOI’s Arrays. We hope to see you at the OOIFB Town Hall!
Event: OOI Facility Board Town Hall
When: Monday, December 12, 2022 from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm Central Time
Lightning Talks: Apply online here: The form will be open until November 21st.
Where: In person at McCormick Place, Room S106a or Virtual Participation.
The Town Hall agenda and additional details are available here.
Read MoreStudent Videos Give Inside Look at Research and Safety
Four students from Queens College were aboard the R/V Marcus G Langseth for a recent ten-day research expedition to the Axial Seamount, a submarine volcano in the northeast Pacific Ocean that erupted in 1998, 2011, and 2015. The students were assisting a National Science Foundation Research team that is deploying autonomous ocean-bottom seismometers on OOI’s Regional Cabled Array as part of a two-year experiment taking place within the predicted time window of the next eruption.
The NSF-funded project is led by William Wilcock from the University of Washington and co-led by Felix Waldhauser, Columbia Climate School’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, who served as chief scientist on this expedition, Maya Tolstoy (UW), and Yen Joe Tan from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, who also was onboard.
Queens college graduate student Jacqueline Singer was onboard to further work towards her master’s degree. She teamed up with undergraduates Rania Taib, Hema Muni, and Julia Sandke to create two videos – one explains their research, while the other provides an insider’s look at safety issues at sea. In the first video, the students give an in-depth look at how they deployed 15 autonomous ocean-bottom seismometers and how they work. In the second video, the students explain the importance of survival suit training, followed by a humorous look at the complex movements needed to successfully suit up in a “Gumby suit.”
Columbia University PhD candidate Theresa Sawi also provides a written account of the expedition here.
https://vimeo.com/user110037220/studentsataxialseamount
https://vimeo.com/user110037220/gumbysuitdemo
Read MoreCatching the Next Eruption of Axial Seamount
Theresa Sawi, a PhD student in Columbia’s Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, shares her reflections and more about the science behind a six-day research expedition to Axial Seamount. She gives a behind the scenes look as researchers from Columbia University on the R/V Marcus G Langseth deployed 15 autonomous ocean-bottom seismometers atop Axial Seamount, a submarine volcano in the northeast Pacific Ocean that erupted in 1998, 2011, and 2015. The research expedition was part of a two-year experiment taking place within the predicted time window of the next eruption.
The seismometers were added to OOI’s Regional Cabled Array. To read Sawi’s account, click here.
[media-caption path="/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Langseth.png" link="#"]15 scientists were onboard the Langseth, with ranks ranging from professor to undergraduate researcher. Credit: Theresa Sawi.[/media-caption]Read More
From Northern California to Ocean Engineer
It seems improbable that someone living in Gridley, a small farm town of 8,000 people in very northern California, would end up as an OOI engineer whose favorite part of the job is being at sea. But that’s the story of Irene Duran, Engineering Assistant III at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). Irene just spent the month of July in the Irminger Sea, preparing and monitoring instrumentation before deployment, downloading data after recovery, and checking the health of recovered instruments that had spent a year in the cold and windy north Atlantic. Interestingly, going to sea was not part of her original job description.
Irene’s journey to the ocean was a circuitous one. She attended California State University, Chico and Butte Community College and “meandered into” an engineering major. Most of the college recruiters visiting her university were focused on manufacturing and other building-related trades. In such a land-locked setting three hours from the coast, ocean science-related work was never presented as a possibility.
By happenstance, Irene was presenting her research on “Using Differential Privacy on Histograms for Information Protection” at a SACNAS (Society for the Advancement of Chicano/Hispanics and Native Americans in Science) Conference. There she met George Liles, the co-director of the Woods Hole Partnership Education Program (PEP). He was the first to talk with her about Woods Hole, how engineering fits into science, and the potential for her to have a science-related career. It was also the first time she had heard of Cape Cod. The rest, as it is said, is history.
The summer of her junior year, she ended up in a WHOI biology lab working with Drs. Heidi Sosik and Stace Beaulieu. There she took on the task of testing cameras for a small-sized, low-cost, low-power plankton imaging system. From that experience, she turned her attention to underwater instrumentation.
[media-caption path="/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Irene-at-work.png" link="#"]Irene at work aboard the R/V Neil Armstrong. Credit: Sheri N. White © WHOI.[/media-caption]The following summer in 2019, Irene returned to WHOI, this time as a Summer Student Fellow, working in the REMUS Lab with Chris Rauch and Gwyneth Packard. Her task in this lab was working on developing a lighting system to explore different light configurations that worked best in fully illuminating images taken by the REMUS Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs).
Both summer experiences caused her to fall in love with the area and the work. Directly after she graduated in 2020 with a degree in Mechatronic Engineering (geared to robotics and automation), she left her family, friends, and her familiar life, and headed east to return to Cape Cod. She moved without a job, but was determined to work at WHOI. Irene spent a seven-month stint at the local grocery store before an appropriate engineering job opened up at WHOI with the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) and the Upper Ocean Processes Group Meteorological Calibration Lab. “It was exactly what I wanted to do – an engineering position working with surface and subsurface instrumentation,” she explained. Her primary responsibility on land is refurbishing and calibrating meteorological sensors that adorn the top of OOI Surface Moorings and other mooring sites world-wide
Irene explained that OOI was and remains a great match. “The people in OOI and Calibration Lab were so welcoming and right off the bat, I felt very comfortable with everyone I worked with.” She also mentioned that she liked how many women work in OOI. Irene’s immediate supervisor, Dr. Sheri N. White, made it possible for Irene to go to sea, even though it wasn’t in her initial job description.
Going out to sea is Irene’s favorite part of her job in spite of the long hours, strenuous work, done often in difficult conditions. “In some ways being at sea feels like a vacation, even though it is clearly not. We are working all of the time, but we get to focus on just one thing. We don’t have much access to life back on land and staying focused on one thing is very refreshing. I feel refreshed coming back from sea, that’s for sure,” Irene said. She’s been to sea for four OOI deployment and recovery expeditions.
In addition to her numerous responsibilities on OOI sea-going cruises, Irene likes to write blogs in her spare time. She enjoys sharing the perspective of what it is like to work at sea, what life is like aboard a ship, and what it is like to make a living as an oceanographer. She writes her blogs in Spanish so the word gets out to a broader audience. “So few of us get to do this work. It is really unique and I like to share what it is like with others,” she added.
Irene credits her supervisor, Dr. Sheri N. White, for giving her opportunities to advance her career and expand her skills. As an example, on the next cruise to the OOI Coastal Pioneer Array this fall, Irene will assume the roles of both Instrument Lead and Profiler Mooring Lead. For this, Irene will be working with buoys, Acoustic Doppler Current Profilers and Wire-Following Profilers – helping to recover them, download data, and prepare them for refurbishment. This experience will be a good stepping stone for her to assume additional responsibilities and opportunities to be on the water in the future. Irene’s goal is to one day be the Chief Scientist on an OOI cruise.
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Canadian and OOI Gliders Meet in Pacific
In an important collaborative undertaking, the Ocean Observatories Initiative (OOI) Glider 363 and a Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) Glider crossed paths along Line P, a transect line in the northeast Pacific. This modern day “intersection” provides an opportunity for scientists to have co-located science profiles to match up with sensor data, but also an efficient way to extend data about ocean conditions along Line P throughout the year.
Line P consists of 27 stations extending from Vancouver Island to Ocean Weather Station Papa (OWSP), also known as “Station Papa.” OSWP (located at 50°N, 145°W) has one of the oldest oceanic time series records dating from 1949-1981. This 32-year-old record is supplemented by data collected by shipboard measurements along Line P conducted by DFO three times/year. The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration also has a surface mooring at Station Papa, which contributes year-round data to this important record. Beginning in 2014, OOI also enhanced Station Papa with an array of subsurface moorings and glider measurements.
An important intersection
[media-caption path="/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/image012.png" link="#"]The OOI glider left from Newport, OR aboard the RV Zephyr and was deployed on July 3 in open ocean over the Juan de Fuca Ridge. The glider transited along Line P to the Papa Array starting from station P16. A DFO glider was traversing Line P at the same time, providing an opportunity for US and Canadian scientists to have co-located profiles to match up with sensor data. [/media-caption]The DFO glider was deployed in late May returning from OWSP. The OOI glider left from Newport, OR aboard the RV Zephyr and was deployed on July 3 at 46 N 130W in open ocean over the Juan de Fuca Ridge. The glider transited along Line P to OOI’s Global Station Papa Array starting from station P16, which is in international waters just outside the Canadian EEZ. A DFO glider was traversing Line P at the same time, providing an opportunity for US and Canadian scientists to have co-located profiles to match up with sensor data.
At the point of the cross-over the OOI glider had been at sea for about 40 days. Both OOI’s and DFO’s glider have very similar sensors onboard that measure temperature, salinity, pressure, oxygen, optical backscatter, chlorophyll, and colored dissolved organic matter. These measurements when compared to historical data provide insight into existing and possibly changing conditions in the water column.
“At a very basic level these deep-ocean rendezvous provide us with an opportunity to compare the sensor data mid-deployment, instead of just at the start or end of their respective deployments. This can help us look for any trends or offsets that might indicate sensor issues – such as aging, fouling, and other issues that may impede performance. This information helps people understand and be able to use data from these gliders,” explained Peter J. Brickley, OOI’s Glider Lead. “The other outcome is that our joint glider data can contribute extra sampling along Line P. While there are several cruises along this line every year, those efforts are spaced far apart in time (sometimes several months). Autonomous gliders can fill some of the gaps, are relatively inexpensive to operate, and can help better delineate conditions, including changing anomalies as they occur.”
Another contributing factor to making this initial glider cross-over a useful test case is that a scheduled DFO Line P cruise on the Canadian Coast Guard Ship John P. Tully was happening concurrently along Line P. The team aboard the Tully started sampling in early August and are scheduled to complete sampling by the month’s end. The ship collected some data in the vicinity of both gliders, offering another opportunity to compare and contrast data.
[media-caption path="/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/zephyr2.png" link="#"]The OOI glider deployed from the R/V Zephyr heading north to reach Line P in time to cross-over with DFO’s glider to share and contrast data collected. Credit: R/V Zephyr ©WHOI. [/media-caption]While the glider cross-over is an important first, it is emblematic of the ongoing cooperative effort between the Canadian DFO, NOAA, and OOI teams sampling in this important region. Communications occur regularly between OOI team members and the Chief Scientist conducting DFO shipboard sampling, as well as between OOI and NOAA personnel.
Added Brickley, “This recent excursion along Line P was planned, but also a serendipitous opportunity that could be leveraged quickly. Once we all have the chance to assess the data provided, we’ll be in a better position to explore making this a more regular occurrence. If it turns out that our sampling schemes are easily aligned, that could be another step to help advance understanding of ocean processes from coastal, eutrophic waters into the heart of the high nitrate, low chlorophyll area of the NE Pacific.”
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Sept 21 Noon Eastern: Live Ship-to-Shore Video from Endurance 17
Mark your calendar to tune in to a rare opportunity to see live OOI action from the R/V Thomas G. Thompson: Wednesday September 21 at noon eastern. Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants will be interviewing Chief Scientist Jonathan Fram as he and his team get ready to depart on the 17th recovery and deployment expedition of the Coastal Endurance Array. It should be a fun and informative operation. Register here, then tune in.
Ride Along with Endurance 17 Expedition
Don’t miss this opportunity to go to sea and participate in an OOI recovery and deployment expedition without having to board a ship. Follow along as progress is reported daily here.
A sneak peek follows:
[caption id="attachment_24411" align="alignnone" width="640"]
The Washington Inshore Surface Mooring is secured after having been brought onboard.[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_24410" align="alignnone" width="469"]
Washington Offshore Surface Piercing Profiler Mooring awaiting deployment.[/caption]
[caption id="attachment_24409" align="alignnone" width="640"]
The large blue rectangle is the bottom of a multi-function node, which contains instruments and power, and sits on the ocean bottom. Here it is awaiting recovery.[/caption]
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Scientists and Fishers Learning from One Another
At a recent meeting of the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen’s Alliance, it was evident how much can be learned when scientists and fishers share information. An example was the shifting location of the Gulf Stream. Fred Mattera, President of Commercial Fisheries Research Foundation of Rhode Island, wondered why the temperature of the continental shelf was 72 degrees in December. He contacted Glen Gawarkiewicz, a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution senior scientist, to share his observation. Gawarkiewicz used data from OOI’s Coastal Pioneer Array to confirm that the Gulf Stream, which carries warm and salty water, had shifted 120 miles north. Gawarkiewicz explained to the audience that he would have never identified this change if it hadn’t been for Mattera’s contact.
This is but one example of how those who use the ocean and those who study it can benefit by sharing information. To read more:
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