OR&R and the U.S. Coast Guard are advancing oil spill and disaster response through cutting-edge research and development focused on oil spill science, remote sensing technology, and data delivery.

MAR. 24, 2025 — Under a five-year operational agreement, NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) and the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) have committed to using OR&R’s web-based geographic information system tool ERMA® as the common operating picture for oil spills, related disaster support functions, and training. A common operating picture is a continuously updated overview of an incident compiled throughout an incident's life cycle, providing real-time situational awareness across all levels of incident management and across jurisdictions.

To support this interagency agreement, OR&R and partners have developed best practices and training materials to aid USCG pilots and other responders in effectively collecting and delivering imagery for oil characterization and mapping. This effort also identified tools to produce shore-based and open-water image maps and mosaic imagery that meet NOAA standards and requirements for data packaging. Commonly used in remote sensing, mosaic imagery is a technique where a series of adjacent, overlapping images—typically aerial or satellite photos—are “stitched” together to create a single, seamless image that provides an easy to interpret overview of a large area.

OR&R and partners recently released these resources in the form of two comprehensive job aids, titled "Oil Spill Response Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS): Guidance and Training," and "Oil Spill Response Data Management, Storage, and Delivery Guidance.” These resources cover every stage of response operations for the use of UAS use for shoreline and on-water spill response—from mission planning and data collection to image mapping and short and long-term data storage—ensuring seamless integration with NOAA systems like the Data Integration Visualization and Reporting (DIVER) warehouse and ERMA.

Key highlights of the new resources include training materials for USCG pilots to capture imagery for oil characterization and mapping; tutorials and a quick reference matrix for selecting optimal remote sensing tools based on specific response needs, and updated resources integrated into USCG Aviation Training Center programs and UAS flight Operations protocols.

These job aids expand OR&R's resource library, including the Open Water Oil Identification Job Aid for Aerial Observation, published in 2016 to standardize language and streamline assessments of oil appearance and distribution on water. Together, these tools equip response teams with the knowledge and resources to act swiftly and effectively during critical situations.

Funding for the Oil Spill Response Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) Guidance and Training Job Aid was provided by the USCG Great Lakes Oil Spill Center of Expertise (GLCOE). This job aid was developed by Research Planning, Inc. in close collaboration with USCG’s GLCOE and NOAA OR&R.

MAR. 24, 2025 — The Trajectory Analysis Planner, or TAP, is an important tool in the NOAA Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R)’s suite of oil spill response and planning tools.

TAP estimates the probability that an oil spill from potential sources might threaten specific shorelines, including how long it might take for spilled oil to arrive onshore, which locations could be most heavily impacted, and how much oil might threaten a location. These results help the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) and state and local responders to prepare for and limit environmental damage from potential oil spill events.

With funding from and in collaboration with the USCG Great Lakes Oil Spill Center of Expertise (GLCOE), OR&R has developed a new TAP project for Lake Erie simulating spills from 20 potential spill sites in the Lake Erie area—including 13 shoreline sites where oil is stored or transferred and seven sites in shipping lanes where incidents could occur.

Modeling Oil’s Behavior in Lake Erie Ice

Implementations of TAP analyze hundreds of trajectory runs of OR&R’s GNOME (General NOAA Operational Modeling Environment) tool, driven by modeled wind and water currents. Unique to the new Lake Erie TAP is the incorporation of ice concentration over a long time record.

An important advancement for Lake Erie TAP is that the effects of ice on oil transport are included in the model. Ice cover, shown to limit the transport of spilled oil, is highly variable on Lake Erie. Including this variable in the analysis aids in the development of realistic local-area contingency plans for oil spill response.

Support for Great Lakes Response Activities

The USCG GLCOE is mandated to identify gaps in oil spill research as it relates to the Great Lakes; conduct research, development, testing, and evaluation of response technologies and techniques; and educate and train responders in USCG District 9. This latest TAP project joins several other related advancements in the Great Lakes region.

“The addition of Lake Erie to NOAA’s WebTAP affords a new level of open access for contingency planners, community members, and anyone concerned about the possibility of oil spills in Lake Erie from known shoreline-based points or hypothetical maritime accidents out in the shipping lanes,” says USCG GLCOE Research Scientist Matt Alloy, Ph.D., who oversaw the project. “The addition of three different views—all-season, without ice present, and with ice present—demonstrates the need for contingency planning to account for seasonal factors such as ice cover.”

Oil spill responders and planners can view Lake Erie TAP results within OR&R’s WebTAP viewer.

The latest ERMA dashboard update introduces several new features designed to improve user experience and data accessibility. A photo carousel now offers a visually engaging way to browse images, while tab cards provide an organized, at-a-glance view of key data points. Button placements within ERMA have been updated for a more intuitive layout, and users now have added abilities to display percentage values alongside raw data and apply new sort options to streamline data analysis.

Users can also now export data directly from the View Data table, making data sharing and analysis more accessible than ever before. To find the View Data option, find a layer, hover over, and right click on the layer. Users can also find this option by clicking on the vertical ellipsis.

From the View Data table, users can apply additional filters before data export. In the upper right-hand corner is a menu where the Export Layer Data option lives. Accessing this option prompts terms of use that must be agreed upon before proceeding, as well as the different formats data can be exported in.

The latest versions, CAMEO Data Manager 4.4.0 and Tier2 Submit 2024, were released on November 4, 2024. These versions have many enhancements, including:

• State-specific data fields updated for regulatory report year 2024 for several states.
• Improvements to the Contact record interface so that the initial data fields display dynamically based on the chosen Contact Type(s). This will lead to better data quality and eliminate a potential area of confusion for some users.
• Updates to both the pre-populated county lists and the county-based latitude/longitude verification tool with the latest county names and boundaries from the U.S. Census Bureau.

• New National Incident Management System (NIMS) resource types from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which help responders and planners categorize and discuss resources with a shared understanding on what each resource includes and its response capabilities.
• Changes to the advanced options for PDF reports in CAMEO Data Manager to allow Contacts to be optional, so that they can be excluded in cases of privacy concerns.
• Added ability to run the newest version of the program side-by-side with an older version, which allows users to compare features and do advanced quality assurance checks. This feature is particularly useful for state-level data collectors who use Tier2 Submit to view (and validate) Tier II forms submitted by users throughout their state.

Both programs are part of the CAMEO® software suite, a set of tools to help emergency planners and responders with hazardous chemical releases. Annually, the suite has over eight million page views online and more than 500,000 downloads of the desktop and mobile app programs.

The CAMEO software suite has been jointly developed by the NOAA Office of Response and Restoration and the EPA Office of Emergency Management for more than 35 years. Programs within the suite are vital components of many emergency responder and planner toolkits. All of the programs in the suite are available to users at no cost. For more details and to subscribe to future updates, see the official CAMEO Data Manager and Tier2 Submit release announcement.