Category: Environment

NOAA Staff Have Been Busy Installing Mooring Buoys for Public Use Across America

7/3/2025 - By sanctuaries.noaa.gov. Mooring buoys are a vital part of the infrastructure in many national marine sanctuaries. These buoys make it safer and easier for boaters, divers, paddlers, and snorkelers to access sanctuary sites—while protecting sensitive resources like coral reefs, seagrass beds, and historic shipwrecks from anchor damage. Across the sanctuary… SEE MORE

Five Reasons Seamounts Matter

7/1/2025 - By sanctuaries.noaa.gov. Just like on land, there are vast mountains that lie deep beneath the ocean’s waters. Seamounts are underwater mountains that rise at least 3,300 feet (1,000 meters) from the surrounding seafloor, most of which include the remains of extinct volcanoes. These submarine mountains can be found in every ocean basin… SEE MORE

Mild to Moderate Harmful Algal Bloom Predicted for Western Lake Erie

6/27/2025 - By noaa.gov. NOAA and its research partners are forecasting a mild to moderate harmful algal bloom (HAB) in western Lake Erie this summer. This year’s bloom is expected to measure 3 on the HAB severity index, with a potential range of 2–4. The HAB severity index is based on the… SEE MORE

Image Credits: Jeremy Piper/Manatee County

NOAA Supports Major Acquisition Project Along Florida’s Manatee River

6/19/2025 - By coast.noaa.gov. Florida’s Manatee County acquired 68 acres of property along the Manatee River with support from a $5 million NOAA grant, permanently preserving the coastal habitat for the public in an area undergoing rapid development. The land will serve as a public preserve, providing numerous benefits including outdoor recreation… SEE MORE

Lane Simmons of the U.S. Geological Survey collects a water-quality sample at the Mississippi River at Baton Rouge, Louisiana (USGS 07374000). Credit: Scott Dennis, USGS.

NOAA Forecasts an Average Summer ‘Dead Zone’ in Gulf

6/11/2025 - By oceanservice.noaa.gov. Low-oxygen conditions expected to impact 5,574-square-mile area NOAA is forecasting this summer’s Gulf of America (formerly Gulf of Mexico) “dead zone” to be average-sized, covering approximately 5,574 square miles — an area roughly three times the size of Delaware. The dead zone, or hypoxic zone, is an area of… SEE MORE

NOAA Ocean Outlook Projects Cooler Deep Waters for Gulf of Maine

6/1/2025 - By noaa.gov. The Gulf of Maine, historically one of the fastest-warming ocean regions in the world, is predicted to experience cooler bottom-water temperatures this spring and summer, according to a new experimental outlook developed by NOAA scientists. Initial signs of this shift were reported by NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Centeroffsite link and… SEE MORE

With the newly installed culvert in place, fish, sediment, and water can pass through unimpeded.

One-Two Punch of Funding Brings Project Success in Minnesota

5/21/2025 - By coast.noaa.gov. The Takeaway: The Minnesota Coastal Management Program used funding from two sources to take a culvert replacement project from engineering and design all the way to implementation. Brook trout are native to Minnesota’s headwaters and small streams like Tischer Creek in and around the city of Duluth. They’re… SEE MORE

Nightfall no Longer Offers a Reliable Reprieve for Western US Firefighters

5/17/2025 - By research.noaa.gov. For decades, firefighting crews counted on falling temperatures and rising humidity at night to dampen wildfire activity, allowing them to rest, regroup and prepare for the next day. Over the last 20 years though, satellite measurements have confirmed a change reported in the western US by firefighters on… SEE MORE

Remotely operated vehicle Deep Discoverer traverses over an extensive field of ferromanganese nodules that formed the bulk of the hard seafloor substrate for much of Dive 17 of the 2021 North Atlantic Stepping Stones expedition. (Image credit: NOAA)

“The next gold rush” Executive order unlocks access to deep seabed minerals

5/9/2025 - By noaa.gov. President Trump signed an Executive Order establishing a framework for American companies to identify and retrieve offshore critical minerals and resources. The Executive Order prioritizes U.S. leadership in seabed mapping and mineral exploration, ensuring reliable access to critical minerals like manganese, nickel, cobalt and rare earth elements. Critical minerals… SEE MORE

Deep Learning on the Rocky Shore

4/25/2025 - By tula.org. Drones allow researchers to do marine surveys from the sky. Now artificial intelligence is offering a quantum leap in image processing. What are your respective backgrounds in working with these kinds of AI processes? Taylor: I did my master’s degree at Ontario’s University of Waterloo on computer vision systems… SEE MORE