While NOAA has had to cancel many of its planned research surveys in Alaska, it has been able to conduct a number of scaled-back research surveys in 2020. One such survey that will be finishing up this week is in the Arctic and was conducted on board NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson to collect critical data supporting a long time series involving many scientific partners.
A new NOAA analysis of ocean temperature data finds that for the 52-year period from 1968 to 2019, 72 to 79 percent of the ocean area showed warming, while only 1 to 3 percent exhibited cooling.
NOAA Ship Ronald H. Brown steamed out of Charleston, South Carolina, on February 15, 2018, for a multi-stage trip around the world to improve ocean data that informs US and global weather prediction.
On Friday, August 25, U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy will sail from Dutch Harbor, Alaska, with a team of NOAA scientists and collaborators on a 22-day cruise to study environmental change in the western Arctic Ocean.
The Southern Ocean that encircles Antarctica lends a considerable hand in keeping Earth's temperature hospitable by soaking up half of the human-made carbon in the atmosphere and a majority of the planet's excess heat. Yet, the inner workings — and global importance — of this ocean that accounts for 30 percent of the world's ocean area remains relatively unknown to scientists, as observations remain hindered by dangerous seas.
Middle and high school students in six cities across America have won the chance to deploy a NOAA global ocean drifter for Earth Day, earning the opportunity to launch a small 44-pound floating buoy into an ocean current.