Status of NOAA's ocean activities relating to Homeland Security

Abstract

The US Department of Commerce, through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, is using its scientific and technical resources to address Homeland Security challenges on our maritime borders. Following September 11, 2001, the NOAA Ship Whiting performed a strategic commercial route survey in Boston using similar technologies to those employed by the US Navy mine countermeasures community. This prototype effort was so successful that NOAA's Office of Coast Survey began coordinating its harbor surveys to meet both its goal to reduce the critical survey backlog and the new Maritime Domain Awareness priorities of the US Coast Guard and US Naval Oceanographic Office. NOAA's Office of Marine and Aviation Operations fleet support procured additional high-resolution high-speed side scan sonar and data management equipment and Coast Survey modified operational schedules to meet the new 18-month goals set in October 2001. The NOAA National Ocean Service Offices of Coast Survey, Response and Restoration, and the Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services, together with NOAA's National Weather Service and the Naval Oceanographic Office, are also developing data sharing and coproduction arrangements related to marine modeling and forecasting. These elements are critical to predicting the waterborne dispersion and movement of substances in the Nation's ports and coastal regions. When combined with the surveying and data sharing protocols, the modeling data can inform both strategists and tacticians in the daily management and disaster response at the country's major ports.