As impact became imminent, NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) began tracking the storm’s path and intensity.

OR&R facilitated daily coordination calls with several other NOAA entities along the coast  (including National Marine Fisheries Service and National Marine Sanctuaries) to prepare for potential impacts to NOAA staff, assets, and facilities. As OR&R continued to monitor the storm’s path and it became apparent Florence would make landfall in Wilmington, North Carolina, the team prepared to deploy staff to the area.

Among the first to arrive on scene were scientific support coordinator Frank Csulak and spatial data experts George Graettinger and Mike Greer, who support the management of OR&R’s Environmental Response Management Application (ERMA) — a mapping tool frequently used as a common operating picture by NOAA, the U.S. Coast Guard, and other response agencies. Their goal was to ingest post-event data from the National Geodetic Survey, Office for Coast Survey, Environmental Protection Agency, and other sources to determine the worst hit areas for flooding, coastal erosion, displaced vessels, and waterway obstructions. This effort allowed the U.S. Coast Guard to focus primarily on conducting search and rescue operations and clearing waterways to reconstitute vessel traffic, especially in the ports of Wilmington and Morehead City.

“The OR&R team knocked it out of the park in terms of supporting the Coast Guard,” Csulak said, adding that the NOAA team had the lead for using the National Geodetic Service’s aerial imagery to locate and identify displaced vessels. The Coast Guard then used ERMA as their common operating picture to visualize the location of these vessels, the habitats they ended up in, and prioritize vessels for removal.  

On Sept. 19, 2018, the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s mission assignment tasking took effect and a pollution task force was established. Emergency Support Function #10 (ESF-10) is the framework coordinating federal and state agency response to actual or potential oil spills or hazardous material releases in the FEMA designated counties. Partnering ESF-10 agencies include NOAA and the Environmental Protection Agency.

The ERMA team was now focused on analyzing aerial imagery to locate displaced vessels and potential hazardous substance releases. This coupled with field assessments helped the Coast Guard determine which vessels had the highest chance of leaking or those that were located in the most environmentally sensitive areas.

“If vessels are not removed from the waterways, they will become a navigational hazard, or if they are not removed they could break up and create more of a marine debris problem,” Csulak said. “If the vessels are allowed to remain in the sensitive areas, they will destroy those areas through increase erosion and loss of habitat.”

Other team members coordinated with various state, federal, and nongovernmental agencies to develop best management practices to minimize any collateral impacts from the displaced vessels and coordinate Threatened and Endangered Species Act and Historic Preservation Act concerns with ongoing and planned response activities.

The Coast Guard and NOAA work to remove the pollutants from displaced vessels, however, the state of North Carolina is responsible for either arranging for the return of the vessels to their owners, relocating them out of sensitive areas, or disposing of them. NOAA advised the state of the environmental risks to habitats such as waterways, wetlands, oyster beds, seagrass beds, turtle and bird nesting areas. 

OR&R’s Katie Krushinski stepped on scene as a member of the North Carolina Joint Information Center — serving as the link between NOAA and the incident command post. She vetted NOAA-related inquiries from the public and media and was the conduit to share NOAA-specific information to support U.S. Coast Guard press releases. Krushinski’s role evolved and she served as the public information officer for the ESF-10 response.

“As for inter-agency coordination, the relationship we have developed with the Coast Guard for post-hurricane response is great,” Krushinski said. “Many of us deployed to hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria last year and we’ve all been through this process before. We were able to pick up where we left off last year and our interactions were flawless.”

As of Monday, Oct. 1, 2018, a new team of experts relieved the on-scene staff. OR&R personnel overcame the challenges of working in the aftermath left by Hurricane Florence — dealing with road closures and other navigation issues as well staffing and resource shortages.

Teams will continue to notify and educate vessel owners on the best ways to remove their property. The Coast Guard will assess the targets one more time before beginning hazardous material removal. This is an ongoing response that takes planning to ensure the safety of the environment as well as the community. As the establishment phase of the response efforts wraps up, implementation of response strategies and actions will soon begin.

Much of the success in responding to Florence can be attributed to the prolonged response during the 2017 hurricane season.

“We learned some valuable lessons about data management from last year’s hurricanes and we naturally pulled lessons learned into our processes this year," Krushinski said. "We ensured those same pitfalls didn’t happen this year and we were able to find solutions very early on. This allowed a more productive flow of information, helped those in the field do their job easily, and ultimately, helps the ecosystem recover as quickly as possible.”

The task force has identified 223 vessels in North Carolina impacted by the hurricane that hit the East Coast earlier this month. This number is expected to grow as initial assessments continue.

NOAA is providing scientific and technical aid, including geographic information system (GIS) support, to the incident command. The vessels discovered during the initial assessment — the majority of which are recreational vessels — are being tagged with a sticker requesting owners to contact a hotline to report the vessel’s salvage or request assistance. Vessels actively leaking pollution are the highest priority. Vessels that are sunk or damaged will be mitigated to avoid pollution release and may be relocated to avoid becoming a future hazard to navigation.

“Our number one priority during pollution assessments is the safety of our responders and the public affected by these potential hazards,” said U.S. Coast Guard Commander JoAnne Hanson in a Coast Guard press release. “Our objective is to complete assessment and mitigation of all hazardous materials and substances, including displaced vessels and chemical containers, that resulted from the hurricane.”

NOAA teams expect to remain on scene for at least several more weeks. The Coast Guard continues to survey waterways and place stickers on vessels advising the owners on their options and actions they need to undertake if they elect to remove their own vessels properly. The goal is to recover property with minimal environmental impact.

ESF-10 partner agencies have issued guidance for vessel owners who wish to remove their boats damaged by Hurricane Florence from local waterways. The Coast Guard has estimated that the majority of vessel owners, roughly 80 percent, will likely remove their own vessels — making the issued guidance an important component for pollution mitigation.

Contact Information

• Anyone witnessing an oil spill, chemical release, or maritime security incident should call the National Response Center hotline at 1-800-424-8802.
• Any containers smaller than 55 gallons (approximately two feet wide by three feet tall) should be reported to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality or local municipal waste facilities.
• Owners of storm-impacted vessels can contact the teams at 757-355-1042 to report their salvage plan or request assistance.

View the most recent Coast Guard press release for more information.

Hurricane Florence left a coastal disaster in its wake that continues to severely impact communities, ecosystems, and economies. The remnant catastrophic flooding in North and South Carolina continues to test responders as they assess coastal damage, clear debris and displaced vessels, address pollution, and reopen navigable waterways.

Both OR&R’s Emergency Response Division and Assessment and Restoration Division have staff in North Carolina to support abandoned vessel assessment and pollution response. OR&R will assist the Coast Guard with ESF-10 (Environmental Support Function) to identify and remove stranded and sunken vessels from marshes and waterways.

To reduce the collateral environmental impacts of the salvage and wreck removal activities, OR&R responders are also refining best management practices based on work done and lessons learned during the 2017 hurricane responses in Puerto Rico, Florida, and the U.S. Virgin Islands and tailoring them to the habitats and resources at risk in North Carolina waters.

OR&R is using National Geodetic Survey imagery to identify pollution targets post-storm and is currently supporting two command posts. Imagery is processed and posted online within 12 hours, including flight and processing time, and may be viewed online via the NGS aerial imagery viewer. NOAA's aerial imagery captures storm damage to coastal areas and aids safe navigation. It is a cost-effective tool for determining the extent of flood damages and assessing damage to major ports and waterways, coastlines, infrastructure, and coastal communities.

Office for Coast Survey is completing its work to survey ports and navigable waterways for any obstructions and hazards. OR&R’s Disaster Preparedness Program continues to provide situational awareness on NOAA’s continued efforts to support these mission response activities.

“NOAA’s Navigation Services Division conducts surveys and assessments in order to provide the Coast Guard with critical information to reconstitute and resume the flow of commercial operations vital to the North Carolina economy and national interests,” said Frank Csulak, NOAA scientific support coordinator, in a U.S. Coast Guard press release.

The Coast Guard advises all mariners to exercise extreme caution when transiting due to possible shoaling, debris and aids to navigation that still may be off-station or unreliable. Mariners should report any hazards to navigation to the Coast Guard Sector North Carolina command center at 919-722-4884.

For more information about NOAA’s Hurricane Florence response efforts, view the latest article “After landfall: 4 ways NOAA is helping your community recover from Florence.”

Hurricane Florence made landfall this morning near Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina after downgrading to a Category 1 storm — though the hurricane remains a life-threatening event and has caused severe flooding and left hundreds of thousands of people without power. Florence was moving slowly westward at 6 mph with sustained winds of 90 mph when it made landfall. Heavy rainfall, upwards of 20 inches in some locations, is expected to continue and will cause severe flooding across portions of the Carolinas into the weekend.

OR&R personnel will focus on  pollution-related assistance — though responders will likely not be able to assess the full scope of the storm’s impacts until next week at the earliest. In previous hurricanes, NOAA has assisted the U.S. Coast Guard with information management, derelict vessels, oil spills, hazardous material releases, and marine debris.

In addition to household hazardous materials, commercial oil, and other materials, the area of impact has a significant number of waste lagoons associated with the agricultural industry which are also a pollution concern. The Environmental Protection Agency has also been deployed to assist with Emergency Support Function (ESF) 10 for Oil and Hazardous Substances response efforts, and has identified 40 Superfund sites, oil sites, and other facilities that pose a pollution risk.

Weather conditions are still severe.  

“Once weather subsides and conditions become safe for first responders, we will begin search and rescue, focus on environmental impacts and begin the process to re-open our ports,” said Capt. Bion Stewart, incident commander of the Coast Guard’s Hurricane Florence response in North Carolina, in a Coast Guard press release.

OR&R is expecting to be supporting three command posts, though the mission and the response needs are still evolving. To stay up to date on Hurricane Florence’s movement, visit the National Hurricane Center or the Hurricane Florence QuickLook.

By Alexis Thorbecke, NOAA Marine Debris Program

Sarah Lowe is the Great Lakes regional coordinator for the Marine Debris Program and is based in Oak Harbor, Ohio. In this role, she works with partners across eight states in the U.S. and the Canadian province of Ontario to address the problem of marine debris in our Great Lakes.

Sarah is uniquely able to bring this vast region together partially because she truly is a member of that community. The Great Lakes have been a part of her life since she was a small child and her fondest memories growing up are of fishing, camping, and exploring on the shores of Lake Erie. However, her passion for aquatic ecosystems was really ignited during a marine biology class in high school.

She took that passion to Bowling Green State University where she received her bachelor's in biology and eventually her master’s studying heavy metals in lake sediments and their effects on mayfly larvae. She has previously worked on other important Great Lakes issues. As a research technician, Sarah documented aquatic invasive species interactions between the round goby and smallmouth bass, as well as industrial impacts to fisheries when she was part of a team evaluating the effects of coal-fired power plants on local fish species.

Sarah first joined NOAA as a John A. Knauss Marine Policy fellow in 2009, during the very early years of the Marine Debris Program. At the time, the program was about half its current size, and marine debris was not on the public consciousness the way it is today. Sarah did not know much about the issue. As she started her work helping to standardize monitoring procedures for the Marine Debris Monitoring and Assessment Project, she realized the enormity of the problem. When the opportunity came about to become the Great Lakes Coordinator of this fledgling program, Sarah jumped at the chance to bring what she had learned in Silver Spring back to her own community.

Until 2015, Sarah also shared time with the NOAA Restoration Center, where she assisted in the management of Great Lakes Restoration Initiative projects, provided technical assistance on restoration techniques to regional partners, participated in natural resource damage assessment cases, and worked with Great Lakes Areas of Concern on restoration and assessing the integrity of the ecosystem.

Addressing debris in the Great Lakes isn’t always easy, there are many challenges that are unique to this region. It is one of the largest regions and is managed by two different countries — the U.S. and Canada. It is also freshwater, which makes it unique to the other regions of the Marine Debris Program. Plastics behave differently in the vast windswept waters of the lakes. Research indicates that debris tends to be break into smaller pieces in the lakes as compared to our world ocean, and since many communities get their drinking water from the lakes, things like microplastics become a huge health concern.

Sarah isn’t daunted by the scope of the problem in front of her. She says working with the young students in her community makes it all worthwhile. Her strong sense of place drives her to help kids fall in love with and care for the lakes the way she has.

“When you see the light bulb go off, it really hammers home why we do what we do,” she said.

When not at work, Sarah loves to travel, read, and spend time with her family on the shore of the lake where she grew up.

Aug. 24, 2018 — As Hurricane Lane continues to move north toward the main Hawaiian Islands, NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration, the U.S. Coast Guard, and many other federal and state agencies are alert and standing by to begin response efforts.

The Central Pacific Hurricane Center announced earlier this week that Hurricane Lane would be closing in on the Hawaiian Islands from Thursday and into the weekend. What began as a Category 4 hurricane was downgraded to a Category 2 this morning, though the latest forecast stated the center of the hurricane is still expected to come dangerously close to the central Hawaiian Islands today.

Life threatening conditions are still possible for the now Category 2 hurricane, with a potential for flash floods, landslides, and swells generating large and rough surf with dangerous rip currents. Hurricane Lane is expected to produce rainfall between 10 to 20 inches, with some areas receiving as much as 40 inches of rain. The Big Island, Maui County, and Oahu are already experiencing tropical storm conditions, including excessive rainfall resulting in flash floods.

In a press release on Wednesday, the the Coast Guard updated the port conditions in advance of Hurricane Lane, alerting the Hawaii County ports that gale force winds were expected within 12 hours.

The Coast Guard requested that all recreational watercraft should seek sheltered waters. Large ocean-going vessels and barges (200 gross tons and above) have been told to prepare to depart port before gale force winds are within 12 hours of the port — when all activity in the port will be suspended until the storm has passed and damage assessment has been completed.

Transportation of bulk oil and hazardous materials within the port has been limited, and shore-side facilities will begin to remove debris and make preparations for heavy weather.

“The Coast Guard reminds the public when hurricane or tropical storm force winds are present to stay off the water and clear of beaches. The Coast Guard's search and rescue capabilities degrade as storm conditions strengthen. This may delay help,” the release advised. “Heed weather watches, warnings, and small craft advisories. Evacuate as necessary. Coast Guard personnel and other emergency responders may not be able to evacuate or rescue those in danger during the storm.”

For more information on Hurricane Lane’s progress and hurricane preparedness, please visit the Central Pacific Hurricane Center or the NOAA Hurricane Lane QuickLook.

Debris on beaches is not only ugly, it can be hazardous to people on the sand or out in the water, and it could also be costing you money!

In a study funded by the NOAA Marine Debris Program, it was found that the presence of debris on beaches influences our decisions to go to a beach littered with debris, or spend money seeking out a cleaner spot. Focusing on southern California, the study surveyed residents in Orange County to understand what features are most important when they consider visiting a beach. These included a scenic view, convenient parking, the distance from their home, and even whether or not the beach is suitable for recreational activities like surfing or fishing. However, most important to residents is that no marine debris is on the beach, and that it features good water quality.

In order to find a beach that fits the bill, residents of southern California find themselves travelling farther from their local beaches, and spending more money as a result. Overall, this results in losses of millions of dollars every year. By reducing marine debris on beaches by just 25 percent, Orange County residents could save roughly $32 million during summer months by decreasing travel distances to enjoy the beach.

The study only focused on one county in the United States, where tourism generated over $1.5 trillion in economic output in 2016, according to the Department of Commerce SelectUSA Program. In a country where one out of every 18 Americans is employed in a travel or tourism-related industry, the potential effects marine debris has on this sector of the economy is substantial.

In order to better understand the financial impacts of marine debris around the country, the NOAA Marine Debris Program is partnering with Abt Associates to conduct a Regional Pilot Study in a first attempt to link beach trip choices with estimates of marine debris at beaches. The regions of interest for this work include the Great Lakes (OH), Mid-Atlantic (DE), Gulf of Mexico (AL), and West Coast (CA). Using this information and data from the previous Orange County study, we can evaluate changes in tourism spending based on increases or decreases in marine debris, improve our understanding of the economic impact of marine debris, and prioritize areas of the United States where future prevention and removal efforts might be needed.

So, where does the debris on beaches come from? Well, it comes from us! People are the sole cause of marine debris, but that means we can also be the solution. You can help reduce marine debris on beaches by practicing these simple tips and tricks:

• Reduce your waste footprint. Reduce the amount of waste you bring to the beach by choosing reusable bottles, food containers, and coolers.
• Dispose of trash properly, no matter where you are. Whether you are inland, or on the beach, trash can travel. Wind, rain, and storms can push trash and litter into storm drains and streams, where it can travel to our ocean and Great Lakes.
• Keep track of your beach toys. Make sure to keep an eye on your beach toys, like balls, sand shovels and nets. What may seem like a good place to leave your stuff while you go explore, may soon be covered in water as the tide rises. These plastic items can quickly wash out to sea and become marine debris.
• Pack it out. No trash cans, or only overflowing bins at your beach? No problem! Pack up all of the trash you bring to the beach and dispose of it properly once you get home.
• Clean up debris. Spend a couple of minutes picking up the debris around you when you leave the beach, and dispose of it properly. Want to do more? Join a local cleanup, or start your own using the Marine Debris Tracker app!

The Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary notified NOAA that a fishing vessel had grounded at the base of a bluff near the sanctuary earlier that day. Attempts to pull the vessel off the bluff were unsuccessful. It was determined that salvage operations would be unsafe.

The 56-foot commercial fishing vessel had a maximum potential capacity of 1,200 gallons of diesel aboard at the time of the spill. The Pacific Quest began discharging diesel fuel after the vessel started to break apart on the rocks — rupturing a fuel line.

The fuel vents were secured during low tide to prevent further discharge. No oil sheen has been observed at this point. As of Monday, Aug. 13 the vessel remained aground and responders were working to remove fuel from tanks on the beach during low tide.

"The Coast Guard and other federal, state and local agencies have established a unified command to ensure a safe and rapid response to the Pacific Quest grounding," said Coast Guard Ensign Kelly Hodges in a press release, the federal on-scene coordinator representative for the unified command. "We are working diligently with our partners to minimize impacts to the public and the environment."

For more information, see the Coast Guard’s most recent update. You can also check out a video of the grounded vessel here.

This new law resulted in NOAA’s Deepwater Ports Project Office — an early predecessor to NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration and the start of OR&R Senior Economist Norman Meade’s 43 year career with NOAA.

“There was an increase in public awareness that came from assessing costs and impacts from potential oil spills,” Norman said, adding that in the mid- to late 1970s NOAA had been very innovative in preparing for the potential negative environmental impacts that the rise in big tankers could lead to. Though, he said, it wasn’t until the Amoco Cadiz oil spill of 1978 that NOAA had the opportunity for a large-scale damage assessment.

On March 16, 1978, the super tanker Amoco Cadizran aground on Portsall Rocks three miles off the northwestern coast of France due to failure of the steering mechanism and stormy weather. The entire cargo — a total of 1,619,048 barrels of oil — spilled into the sea and polluted approximately 200 miles of the Brittany coastline, a very ecologically and recreationally important region of France.

“That was really the first oil spill that was studied in depth by lots of different disciplines under the rubric of the natural resource impacts,” Norman said. “I was involved with conducting a study of the economic consequences, which NOAA headed up in collaboration with French colleagues. For many of us, that was the first time we were involved in an empirical study of the economic impact of an oil spill.

Since then, the tools and methodologies available have evolved to offer a more in-depth precise estimate of the economic and social impacts of oil spills. Find out more below in the Q&A with NOAA economist Norman Meade:

Q: How have the economic assessment methodologies changed over time?

A: Since the late ‘70s when I got started studying the economic effects of oil spills, a number of state and federal laws and regulations have been created to codify how natural resource trustees, such as NOAA, are to go about assessing the ecological and economic impacts of oil spills and hazardous waste site releases. The biggest change over time is probably in the depth and accuracy of the results. They aren’t dramatically different, but they’re more refined and more sophisticated. There’s more data that can be relied on. Advances in the natural sciences have influenced the development of the social sciences — and vice versa — such that we can progressively get better insights into what the ecological and economic consequences are.

Q: When assessing the damages to natural resources, how do you arrive at a monetary number for what they’re worth?

A: Looking at how we estimate the cost of spills, we are using what’s called non-market valuation — things that are not traded in ordinary markets. You don’t go to the store to purchase a trip to a clean beach, you may have other accrued costs — such as for transportation, entry fees, and the like — but you can’t buy that experience in the market.

For example, if you’re trying to preserve an endangered species, say an endangered chinook salmon in the Columbia River, what’s the value of that fish? Is it just the value of the price it could be sold for in a fish market? … Hardly. Some people also want to preserve the fish just for its existence — because people care about them swimming in the wild, maybe it symbolizes their view on what should exist in nature, and obviously Native Americans have their own cultural uses and values for salmon as well. Losses of the mere existence of species (natural resources) that members of the public care about would not otherwise be compensated for were it not for natural resource damage assessment laws and regulations. NOAA and other natural resource trustees act on behalf of the public to quantify losses of resources and/or their services and compensate the public for them. Without a trustee doing that, the public would be at a loss to recover them on their own because of the way our system of laws works regarding publicly owned natural resources. The principle that the natural resource damage assessment process is built on is that the trustees work on behalf of the public to make the public whole and to compensate them through restoration projects that try to provide equivalent projects and services to what they lost. It’s still not a perfect process, but we’re constantly learning and improving on the science, data, and techniques.

Q: How you decide what method to use for valuation?

A: Habitat equivalency analysis is one of the methodologies in our toolbox for analysis to equate the amount of loss, in ecological terms, with the amount of gain, in ecological terms. We avoid putting economic values on the resources until the very end when we estimate the cost for the restoration projects to just equal the level of ecological services lost. That’s an ecological based approach typically used for cooperative resource damage assessment settlements.

Revealed preference methods (RPM) and stated preference methods (SPM), they’re both survey based, i.e. where you have to collect survey data in order to estimate the value lost in, say, recreational activity. The travel cost method (aRPM),takes the cost people incur to travel to and from a site for a recreational activity and derives an estimate of the value of the recreational experience or trip. This allows us to estimate losses from oil spills that close beaches or result in fish consumption advisories. Even when people are just aware that there are contaminated fish in the water, how does that affect their recreational experience? … There’s also another type of human use loss, which I referred to earlier, known as passive use values, where you don’t exactly have to reveal your use of the resources. “Nonuse values” is a little misleading so we prefer to say “passive use values,” are for resources that people care about or just want to know they exist, say for future generations (a bequest value, if you will). That’s where the stated preference method comes in, we typically ask people their willingness to pay to prevent the loss or willingness to receive payment to accept a loss.

Most recently with the Deepwater Horizon natural resource damage assessment, we employed both stated and revealed preference methods to estimate recreational and total value losses. Recreational loss is a subset to the total value loss. Just because some people don’t ever go to the Gulf of Mexico, doesn’t mean that they don’t care about natural resources adversely impacted there by an oil spill. It [passive use value losses] could potentially pertain to anyone in the U.S. population, whereas the recreational losses would be limited to the people who actually recreated, or wanted to recreate, there. It took awhile for the concern over the oiling and the impact on people’s decisions and values to go back to baseline following the spill. Collecting recreational data for two plus years after the spill, there were telephone and mail surveys as well as on-shore surveys and aerial counts of users on the beaches of the Gulf of Mexico. We asked people retrospectively what their reaction was to the injuries caused by the spill. We described in detail the key injuries as we understood them from the natural scientists and we asked them what they would be willing to pay to prevent another Deepwater Horizon spill.

Q: From these surveys, have you discovered some resources that the public values more than others?

A: Different people care about different things. What you learn from these surveys is that there are big difference is what people care about. Such as the more charismatic critters like sea otters, whales, dolphins … not surprisingly more people resonate to those animals with higher expressions of value and importance than they do for small benthic organisms that live down in the sediments. But even for a generally acknowledged charismatic critter, like the sea otter, there are people who value them very little versus those who value them highly. ... Someone in Chicago, who has a greater passive use value for them, may value otters more highly than a fisherman living along the Pacific Coast.

Q: If you could emphasize to the public any one point, what would it be?

A: That human values and the natural world are very complex and we should not assume we understand either based on instinct, rather than sound scientific evidence. Scientists who get degrees in these subject areas will have a lot more knowledge, but that doesn’t mean that people without that knowledge don’t hold legitimate values for elements of the natural world. One of the things that has been a real benefit to society from the natural resource damage assessment process (in addition to compensatory restoration), is the knowledge and insights gained into the natural world and how people value the goods and services they provide.. The damage assessment process is in part a public process. When we get to the stage of having a successful claim and the damage assessment and restoration plan comes out with information on the value of the injuries and the preferred restoration projects, the public gets to comment on that, and in some cases, change the thinking of the trustees about what and how to restore. Outreach, communicating what the trustees are doing to restore those injured resources is key. We try to keep the public informed so they understand what they’re getting back for what they lost.

 

Norman Meade is the senior economist for NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration. He joined NOAA's Deepwater Ports Project Office in 1975 after working as a staff economist for the Environmental Protection Agency. He stepped into the role of senior economist for OR&R in 1990 and after 43 years at NOAA, Norman will be retiring this year. To learn more about Norman's work, read his recent paper titled "Estimating the value of lost recreation days from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill."

Related Articles: 

• Looking Deeper at the Social Science Behind Marine Pollution

This new law resulted in NOAA’s Deepwater Ports Project Office — an early predecessor to NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration and the start of OR&R Senior Economist Norman Meade’s 43 year career with NOAA.

“There was an increase in public awareness that came from assessing costs and impacts from potential oil spills,” Norman said, adding that in the mid- to late 1970s NOAA had been very innovative in preparing for the potential negative environmental impacts that the rise in big tankers could lead to. Though, he said, it wasn’t until the Amoco Cadiz oil spill of 1978 that NOAA had the opportunity for a large-scale damage assessment.

On March 16, 1978, the super tanker Amoco Cadizran aground on Portsall Rocks three miles off the northwestern coast of France due to failure of the steering mechanism and stormy weather. The entire cargo — a total of 1,619,048 barrels of oil — spilled into the sea and polluted approximately 200 miles of the Brittany coastline, a very ecologically and recreationally important region of France.

“That was really the first oil spill that was studied in depth by lots of different disciplines under the rubric of the natural resource impacts,” Norman said. “I was involved with conducting a study of the economic consequences, which NOAA headed up in collaboration with French colleagues. For many of us, that was the first time we were involved in an empirical study of the economic impact of an oil spill.

Since then, the tools and methodologies available have evolved to offer a more in-depth precise estimate of the economic and social impacts of oil spills. Find out more below in the Q&A with NOAA economist Norman Meade:

Q: How have the economic assessment methodologies changed over time?

A: Since the late ‘70s when I got started studying the economic effects of oil spills, a number of state and federal laws and regulations have been created to codify how natural resource trustees, such as NOAA, are to go about assessing the ecological and economic impacts of oil spills and hazardous waste site releases. The biggest change over time is probably in the depth and accuracy of the results. They aren’t dramatically different, but they’re more refined and more sophisticated. There’s more data that can be relied on. Advances in the natural sciences have influenced the development of the social sciences — and vice versa — such that we can progressively get better insights into what the ecological and economic consequences are.

Q: When assessing the damages to natural resources, how do you arrive at a monetary number for what they’re worth?

A: Looking at how we estimate the cost of spills, we are using what’s called non-market valuation — things that are not traded in ordinary markets. You don’t go to the store to purchase a trip to a clean beach, you may have other accrued costs — such as for transportation, entry fees, and the like — but you can’t buy that experience in the market.

For example, if you’re trying to preserve an endangered species, say an endangered chinook salmon in the Columbia River, what’s the value of that fish? Is it just the value of the price it could be sold for in a fish market? … Hardly. Some people also want to preserve the fish just for its existence — because people care about them swimming in the wild, maybe it symbolizes their view on what should exist in nature, and obviously Native Americans have their own cultural uses and values for salmon as well. Losses of the mere existence of species (natural resources) that members of the public care about would not otherwise be compensated for were it not for natural resource damage assessment laws and regulations. NOAA and other natural resource trustees act on behalf of the public to quantify losses of resources and/or their services and compensate the public for them. Without a trustee doing that, the public would be at a loss to recover them on their own because of the way our system of laws works regarding publicly owned natural resources. The principle that the natural resource damage assessment process is built on is that the trustees work on behalf of the public to make the public whole and to compensate them through restoration projects that try to provide equivalent projects and services to what they lost. It’s still not a perfect process, but we’re constantly learning and improving on the science, data, and techniques.

Q: How you decide what method to use for valuation?

A: Habitat equivalency analysis is one of the methodologies in our toolbox for analysis to equate the amount of loss, in ecological terms, with the amount of gain, in ecological terms. We avoid putting economic values on the resources until the very end when we estimate the cost for the restoration projects to just equal the level of ecological services lost. That’s an ecological based approach typically used for cooperative resource damage assessment settlements.

Revealed preference methods (RPM) and stated preference methods (SPM), they’re both survey based, i.e. where you have to collect survey data in order to estimate the value lost in, say, recreational activity. The travel cost method (aRPM),takes the cost people incur to travel to and from a site for a recreational activity and derives an estimate of the value of the recreational experience or trip. This allows us to estimate losses from oil spills that close beaches or result in fish consumption advisories. Even when people are just aware that there are contaminated fish in the water, how does that affect their recreational experience? … There’s also another type of human use loss, which I referred to earlier, known as passive use values, where you don’t exactly have to reveal your use of the resources. “Nonuse values” is a little misleading so we prefer to say “passive use values,” are for resources that people care about or just want to know they exist, say for future generations (a bequest value, if you will). That’s where the stated preference method comes in, we typically ask people their willingness to pay to prevent the loss or willingness to receive payment to accept a loss.

Most recently with the Deepwater Horizon natural resource damage assessment, we employed both stated and revealed preference methods to estimate recreational and total value losses. Recreational loss is a subset to the total value loss. Just because some people don’t ever go to the Gulf of Mexico, doesn’t mean that they don’t care about natural resources adversely impacted there by an oil spill. It [passive use value losses] could potentially pertain to anyone in the U.S. population, whereas the recreational losses would be limited to the people who actually recreated, or wanted to recreate, there. It took awhile for the concern over the oiling and the impact on people’s decisions and values to go back to baseline following the spill. Collecting recreational data for two plus years after the spill, there were telephone and mail surveys as well as on-shore surveys and aerial counts of users on the beaches of the Gulf of Mexico. We asked people retrospectively what their reaction was to the injuries caused by the spill. We described in detail the key injuries as we understood them from the natural scientists and we asked them what they would be willing to pay to prevent another Deepwater Horizon spill.

Q: From these surveys, have you discovered some resources that the public values more than others?

A: Different people care about different things. What you learn from these surveys is that there are big difference is what people care about. Such as the more charismatic critters like sea otters, whales, dolphins … not surprisingly more people resonate to those animals with higher expressions of value and importance than they do for small benthic organisms that live down in the sediments. But even for a generally acknowledged charismatic critter, like the sea otter, there are people who value them very little versus those who value them highly. ... Someone in Chicago, who has a greater passive use value for them, may value otters more highly than a fisherman living along the Pacific Coast.

Q: If you could emphasize to the public any one point, what would it be?

A: That human values and the natural world are very complex and we should not assume we understand either based on instinct, rather than sound scientific evidence. Scientists who get degrees in these subject areas will have a lot more knowledge, but that doesn’t mean that people without that knowledge don’t hold legitimate values for elements of the natural world. One of the things that has been a real benefit to society from the natural resource damage assessment process (in addition to compensatory restoration), is the knowledge and insights gained into the natural world and how people value the goods and services they provide.. The damage assessment process is in part a public process. When we get to the stage of having a successful claim and the damage assessment and restoration plan comes out with information on the value of the injuries and the preferred restoration projects, the public gets to comment on that, and in some cases, change the thinking of the trustees about what and how to restore. Outreach, communicating what the trustees are doing to restore those injured resources is key. We try to keep the public informed so they understand what they’re getting back for what they lost.

Norman Meade is the senior economist for NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration. He joined NOAA's Deepwater Ports Project Office in 1975 after working as a staff economist for the Environmental Protection Agency. He stepped into the role of senior economist for OR&R in 1990 and after 43 years at NOAA, Norman will be retiring this year. To learn more about Norman's work, read his recent paper titled "Estimating the value of lost recreation days from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill."

Behind each of these images is a deeper level to the complexity of the issue of marine pollution — a social one. The effects of marine pollution go beyond environmental issues. They encompass a wide range of impacts, including economic, mental and physical health, cultural, social, and governmental.

The human dimensions of oil spills are widespread.

The most obvious impacts come in the form of acute and chronic health problems and physical injuries. But marine pollution can even affect entire communities — changing their social behavior, altering the local economy, and threatening their natural and cultural resources. 

On an economic level, the impacts can be anything from a fisherman’s temporary loss of income to a complete loss of livelihood. It could even be an industry-wide disruption of normal economic activities.

For the Native American tribes who have cultural ties to their natural resources that go beyond that of simply recreational activities, marine pollution can pose a threat in the form of a degradation of natural heritage, interruption of customary activities, loss of identity, violation, damage, destruction of cultural sites, and a change in values.

An altered experience and use of the natural environment is also an important social aspect to marine pollution. An oil spill or another pollution incident can affect public access to natural environment and infrastructure — including a negative experience or even a loss of recreation opportunity. It can also impact the quality and availability of housing, as well as the quality of community infrastructure.

On a governmental level, many marine pollution incidents result in crime enforcement, hearings, and new legislation or regulation. They can also affect the participation, preparedness, and capacity of response and planning.

Together with federal, state, tribal, industry, and academic partners, NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration looks to social science research to inform our capacity to respond to incidents, assess the damages, and restore resources wherever possible and compensate the public through other restoration projects when it isn’t.

This month, OR&R will be taking a closer look at the relationship between humans, the environment, and the various forms of marine pollution that impact them both. Coming up next, find out about how historic industrial pollution in the Great Lakes has affected a way of life for native communities. Keep an eye out for more upcoming blogs on our website here. 

Related Articles: 

• The True Cost of an Oil Spill: Q&A with a NOAA Economist

At this time, the Elliott Bay Trustees are identifying ways to assess ecological injuries to habitat in the area, and loss of recreational use and and tribal services using a variety of approaches outlined in the Injury Assessment Plan.

Approaches include potential studies that will assist the Trustees in identifying and implementing restoration projects to compensate for those injuries. The studies will focus on species like shellfish and other invertebrates, forage fish, bottom-dwelling fish, and salmon.

The Injury Assessment Plan is a part of the Trustees’ evaluation and restoration of natural resource injuries incurred over time in areas contaminated with hazardous substances such as PCBs, PAHs, metals and other substances.  

The Injury Assessment Plan provides an update on the status of the natural resource damage assessment, information regarding the trustees’ emphasis on specific natural resources and hazardous substances, methods and metrics for quantifying contaminant-related injuries, and the specific studies the trustees have identified to support the damage assessment. The trustees will consider the public comments received, and will release a final injury assessment plan by late 2018 or 2019.

The Duwamish River was once a wide, meandering river with large areas of mudflats and marshes. By the 1940s, channelization and filling had transformed the 9-mile estuary into a 5-mile industrial waterway. This process destroyed 97 percent of the original habitat.

The Lower Duwamish River is still highly developed, with many industrial and commercial facilities lining its banks. Hazardous substances have been released since the early 1900s, resulting in injuries to fish, birds, wildlife, and their habitats, and loss of recreational uses, like fishing.

Comments on the Injury Assessment Plan should be emailed to Rebecca.Hoff@noaa.gov with the subject line: “Comments on Lower Duwamish River Natural Resource Damage Assessment: Injury Assessment Plan.” Comments may also be mailed to: Rebecca Hoff of NOAA Western Region Center, 7600 Sand Point Way Building 1, Seattle, WA 98118.

For more information on the Lower Duwamish River hazardous waste site, visit the Damage Assessment, Remediation, and Restoration Program site. 

By Donna L. Roberts, Office of Response and Restoration

July 25, 2018 — Lieutenant Michael Doig is currently serving as the NOAA scientific support coordinator (SSC) for the Great Lakes, based in Cleveland, Ohio. Like other NOAA SSCs, Doig provides scientific support to the federal on-scene coordinator during responses to oil and hazardous substance releases in the coastal zone.

Being an SSC is both challenging and rewarding, Michael says, adding that what he enjoys most about his job is the opportunity it allows him to work with a close-knit team and to have a positive impact on the environment. He finds it particularly rewarding to interact with community members and utilize his background in education to inform the public on marine pollution.

Michael received his bachelor’s degree in zoology from the University of Hawaii at Mānoa (UH), his master’s in education from Pace University in New York, and a Master of Public Administration degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

While attending UH, Michael was an after-hours resident in the Waikiki Aquarium, ensuring the safety of the aquarium equipment and sea life. Another of the residents was a NOAA employee who piqued his interest about working for NOAA. For his senior project, he assisted a graduate student on a population study of juvenile hammerhead sharks in Kaneohe Bay, catching, tagging, and releasing the sharks from a small boat. He also hosted a weekly radio show on the university’s radio station KTUH.

After graduating from UH, Michael was accepted into the New York City Teaching Fellows program. He taught earth and marine science to high school students in Brooklyn, New York, and attended graduate school at night. A dedicated educator, he produced a collection of videos for his website ScienceBoom: Episode 1: Density Demonstration; Episode 2: Water Circulation and Convection; Episode 3: Balloon in a Car; Episode 4: Chemical Weathering; and Episode 5: Barometric Pressure and Temperature.

As a teacher, his online searches for lesson plan ideas frequently brought him to NOAA websites, where he discovered the NOAA Corps. Armed with knowledge of the Corps, he applied, interviewed and was selected for Basic Officer Training Class (BOTC) 117 that graduated in 2010. Naturally, Michael contributed his videography skills to BOTC 117’s graduation video.

After BOTC, Michael was assigned to the fleet and sailed aboard NOAA ships Pisces, Nancy Foster, and Gordon Gunter. He has sailed extensively throughout the Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean, and along the Eastern Seaboard supporting fisheries and marine mammal research.  

Michael’s wide array of jobs and travel hasn’t stopped with his current job. Since coming on board with OR&R, he has travelled the Great Lakes region extensively including: Port Huron, Sturgeon Bay, Traverse City, Buffalo, Mackinaw City, Chicago, and Detroit. Michael enjoys the unpredictability of his job, recalling what someone once told him, that “You never go to the same response twice.”

“There is no typical day in the life of an SSC. This job requires a lot of travel, meetings, learning, training, and working with a diverse group of stakeholders. With roughly 12 SSCs for the entire U.S., each one is responsible for a large area,” Michael said. “You can have plans to travel to Duluth, Minnesota and suddenly you’re on a flight to St. Thomas [U.S. Virgin Islands]. Being an SSC is a challenge, but it’s highly rewarding!”

Last year, Michael was part of the Hurricane Maria response in the Caribbean. He spent two months in the U.S. Virgin Islands, supporting the U.S. Coast Guard and advising on the removal of grounded and sunken vessels to minimize environmental impacts. He helped develop best management practices, provided training, and briefed field teams on ways to minimize harm to coral, mangrove, seagrass, and turtle-nesting beaches.

As a NOAA diver, Michael was able to put his skills to use relocating corals in the Virgin Islands. When vessels were identified on sensitive coral reefs, salvage crews needed a pathway to remove the vessels from the reef. He worked with NOAA Coral Reef Restoration Ecologist Sean Griffin to relocate and reattach the corals with cement once the operations were completed.

Michael has had a lot of memorable experiences throughout his NOAA career — from trawling in the Gulf of Mexico oil patch and spending Hurricane Sandy at the dock in Newport, Rhode Island, to recording the Bryde’s whale call for the first time and helping coral scientists collect data in the Florida Keys. He also has more fond memories of watching beautiful sunrises and sunsets than he could ever recount.

“Being a part of NOAA provides an incredible array of opportunities, adventures, and once in a lifetime memories,” Michael said.

Michael says that in the future, he sees his role as a scientific support coordinator becoming more important as the industry continues to grow and change.

“New products, sensitive habitats, and an increasingly aware public make protecting the environment a high priority for the American people. Finding ways to balance industries’ needs while at the same time making sure we are prepared and able to respond in the event of a spill is an important part of being an SSC,” Doig said. “As a NOAA Corps officer, I am in this assignment for roughly three years before I go back out for my third sea assignment aboard one of the ships in NOAA’s fleet. I hope to someday be in command of one of those ships.”

Earlier that year, NOAA had established the Spilled Oil Research (SOR) Team to study the effects of oil and gas exploration in Alaska. This team was a network of coastal geologists, marine biologists, chemists, and oceanographers that could go on-scene at "spills of opportunity" with the goal of investigating oil spill impacts.

The Argo Merchant spill was the first major deployment of the SOR Team. The U.S Coast Guard, charged with directing the spill response and cleanup effort, was inundated with competing and often conflicting scientific recommendations. To sort this out, the Coast Guard asked the SOR Team to act as its scientific adviser and be an informal liaison with the scientific community concerned with the spill.

This informal relationship quickly became invaluable. The Coast Guard began to rely on the SOR Team to coordinate the complex scientific issues that arose at spills after the Argo Merchant, including: the Metula, a crude ship grounding off of Tierra del Fuego, Chile; the Amoco Cadiz, a 1.6 million barrel oil spill off the Breton coast of France; and the IXTOC I well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico in June 1979.

The Spilled Oil Research Team — now the Office of Response and Restoration’s Emergency Response Division — has grown from a handful of oceanographers, mathematicians, and computer modelers into a highly diverse team of chemists, biologists, geologists, information management specialists, and technical and administrative support staff. The informal role of scientific support coordinators is now formally recognized in the National Oil and Hazardous Substances Pollution Contingency Plan.

It’s been a busy 35 years (on top of events like the Deepwater Horizon/BP spill), and some of that old history has been forgotten. A couple years ago when I was cleaning out an equipment store room, I discovered this artifact of the earlier days on some old coveralls:

A badge from the original NOAA Spilled Oil Research Team. Credit: Doug Helton, NOAA.

You can find out more about the evolving history of NOAA’s involvement in oil spill response and OR&R’s Emergency Response Division.

By Sarah Allan, Assessment and Restoration Division

Cleaning up after oil spills and chemical releases is one important aspect to disaster response. Within NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration, the Assessment and Restoration Division (ARD) is a group that tackles a different challenge in recovering from disasters. ARD conducts natural resource damage assessment (NRDA), which begins soon after disasters strike to determine what was harmed or “injured” by oil, chemical releases, and other marine pollutants, and what needs to be done to bring back or “restore” the environment to its pre-disaster conditions. While the NRDA can last for years after an oil or chemical spill, it begins as soon as a spill threatens fish, wildlife, habitats, and the ecological and human use services the resources provide.

Time-critical information, also known as ephemeral data, about the environmental conditions and natural resources is important for understanding spill impacts. If early evidence of dead or injured biota and transitory presence of toxic compounds isn’t collected right away, we may never know the true magnitude of harm. This means that ARD scientists need to be prepared for rapid response to disasters, such as oil spills, ship groundings, and hurricanes. NRDA field teams train to be ready to mobilize and collect information and data shortly after disasters are reported. The concentration of oil in the water or the abundance of fish eggs on submerged vegetation in the path of a spill are two examples of ephemeral data that a field assessment for NRDA could document.

To support preparedness ARD has a six person Field Assessment and Support Techniques (FAST) team whose mission is to maintain staff readiness for NRDA field efforts. The FAST program provides guidance, templates, training, and tools to facilitate rapid and consistent execution of critical components of field assessments. For example, guidelines on collecting samples and other field data, and chain of custody forms are available for a range of resources and habitats. Additionally, FAST team members have identified staffing and field gear needs for disaster response, developed and distributed materials to support NRDA spill drills, and organized in-field assessment methods trainings. NOAA often pursues funding for damage assessment and restoration from polluters, so evidence gathered for damages must be sufficient to withstand potential scrutiny in court.

In the event of a disaster that leads to an oil or chemical spill, ARD staff can access resources to guide and facilitate field assessment efforts through different FAST products. For example, the FAST library archives study plans, guidelines, data sheets, agreement templates, and other documentation that can be adapted to the incident-specific needs for field assessment. The FAST team also works to make these documents available to our partners, since NRDA is a collaborative process that may involve federal, state, and tribal trustees, as well as representative of the party responsible for the spill.

OR&R’s assessment and restoration work has a timeframe that extends well beyond the emergency response, but it begins as soon as a spill or threat of a spill occurs. The FAST program is an important way ARD identifies and addresses its disaster response needs. By gathering crucial but fleeting field observations and samples during and after a spill, NOAA and its partners position themselves to obtain appropriate restoration for injured natural resources and assure that the public is compensated for the lost uses and enjoyment of the resources.

More on Disaster Preparedness: 

• Disaster Preparedness: It’s Not a One Time Effort
• Preparing for the 2018 Hurricane Season at FEMA
• Natural Disasters are Part of Nature, Planning for Disasters Should be Just as Natural
• Preparing to Reduce Marine Debris During Hurricanes

By Krista Stegemann, OR&R's Marine Debris Program

Another hurricane season is upon us and with that, it’s time to think about how best to prepare for potential storms. Hurricanes and other severe storms can have devastating impacts on coastal communities, and the safety of you and your family should be the ultimate priority. Take some time to come up with a plan of action in the case of a hurricane in your area. There are lots of great resources on the National Weather Service’s website.

Unfortunately, the wind, rains, and storm surge that can come with hurricanes can also result in a substantial influx of marine debris. Keep this point in mind when prepping your home for an upcoming storm. As long as it is safe and there is time to do so, move any loose items — from lawn ornaments to deck furniture — indoors. These items have the potential to blow away and become marine debris. For larger items that can’t be moved inside, make sure they’re secured carefully and tightly. If you own a boat, do your best to have it moved from the water and into storage. If that’s not possible, then secure everything you can, including lines and hatches.

Sadly, some marine debris resulting from severe storms is unavoidable. Natural disasters such as hurricanes can easily result in debris such as abandoned and derelict vessels, construction debris, and household waste. To most effectively address this storm debris and to mitigate its impacts as much as possible, the NOAA Marine Debris Program is facilitating response planning efforts in coastal states. Through a highly collaborative process with local, state, and federal agencies, response guidance documents are being developed, aimed at improving preparedness and facilitating a coordinated, well-managed, and immediate response to acute waterway debris incidents. These efforts work to outline existing response structures at the local, state, and federal levels, capturing all relevant responsibilities and existing procedures into one guidance document for easy reference in order to facilitate the most effective and smooth debris response operation.

More on Disaster Preparedness: 

• Disaster Preparedness: It’s Not a One Time Effort
• Preparing for the 2018 Hurricane Season at FEMA
• Natural Disasters are Part of Nature, Planning for Disasters Should be Just as Natural
• Restoring Natural Resources after Disasters: NOAA’s FAST Program Keeps Scientists Ready to Respond

Share your #DisasterPreparedness strategy by commenting on our blog, or replying to our Twitter and Facebook.

By Charlie Henry, OR&R’s Disaster Response Center

For most of my life and all my NOAA career, I have lived and worked in the Gulf of Mexico. When Hurricane Katrina made landfall in 2005, I was working for NOAA in their New Orleans office. Katrina was far from the first or last disaster that I had lived through in my long career. Severe weather events are just part of nature, and for me, they’re part of my job as an emergency responder.

As a young teenager, I remember a tornado that ripped a line of destruction very close to our house — only just missing us. It was frightening, and a few neighboring houses weren’t quite so lucky. In 1969, I traveled with my grandfather to see the devastation of Hurricane Camille, which hit along the Mississippi coast. At a very early age, I had developed a healthy respect for the damage that storms could do to people’s lives and property.

My family and I are lucky to have never been an actual victim of a disaster, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t had to deal with property damage and secondary impacts. Luck may be part of our survivability, but planning ahead for what nature threatens is, by nature, just a part of our lives. It’s strange to say, but there have been some special times as well — times when disasters have made me appreciate what I have.

I remember a time in 2008, after Hurricane Gustov, when our roof was severely damaged and we were without power for nearly six weeks. About a week after the storm passed, my wife and daughter went through the National Guard assistance line to get a big, blue FEMA tarp to help keep the rain out. All we needed was the tarp, but those young women and men gave us two tarps, a case of Meals Ready to Eat (MREs), a case of water, and a bag of ice. The ice was a real treat.

Unless you’ve been in such a situation, you might not appreciate a bag of ice or having a family dinner illuminated only by candle light. It was hot and humid, there was no power, and we were eating a combination of our hurricane survival supplies and MREs, but on that night we had something cold to drink. Most importantly, we were sharing a family meal together, we were OK, and we were in good spirits. I still remember that meal as a special family time during what was, for many, a very real disaster.

As an emergency responder, I’m expected to be prepared. First and foremost, I want to know that my family and my dog are safe — even if that means that they’ve had to evacuate so that I don’t have to worry about their safety. Though that hasn’t always been easy, as my wife works in a hospital emergency room. Having a plan is essential. It should focus on family safety, key records, important medicine and prescriptions — including a spare pair of glasses for my wife, who can’t drive without them —  and keeping the cars fueled. My house and property are of far less importance, though they are well stocked with supplies such as food, water, and other essentials at the start of hurricane season. Property can be replaced, but our lives and the lives of those we care about cannot.

No matter where you live, a natural disaster could be a part of your life. Natural disasters just happen — whether we want them to or not. They are not controlled by our calendars, and they don’t care about our wants or our needs. You might not know it, but natural hazard events are relatively common. A quick look at the NOAA National Weather Service’s daily briefing will generally indicate multiple events across the U.S. Of course, not all of these are devastating enough to be considered a disaster.

Most of us have never faced a true major disaster such as the 1700 Cascadia Earthquake and Tsunami that changed the Pacific Northwest and even impacted the island of Japan, the New Madrid earthquakes in the Mississippi Valley during the 19th Century (the largest series of earthquakes documented in the U.S. affecting an area of nearly 2 million square miles), the Tri-State Tornado in 1925 that killed 695 people in Missouri, Illinois, and Indiana, or the more recent Hurricane Maria in 2017 where a recent study estimated that storm-related deaths reached 4,300. For each of these major disasters, there are hundreds of lesser disasters with impacts spread across the U.S.

There are those who think such events are not worth planning for — and if it does happen, they’ll just deal with it. As an emergency responder and preparedness planner, I would naturally believe such reasoning to be a failed contingency plan that would put an individual, their family, their pets, and their property at greater risk. Preparedness means planning for those real threats and hoping that they never happen. If they do, you have a greater chance of surviving physically and mentally if you are prepared in advance. Mentally planning for a disaster is very important to survival and maintaining a positive attitude rather than an overwhelming feeling that you are suddenly a victim. We prepare to be survivors just as the generations that lived before us.

Most of us work, live, and play without too much worry about disasters — and for the most part, we’re safe from these threats. If we weren’t, we probably would live somewhere else. But where? The other day I was reading an article on the top 10 cities identified by an insurance company study as the safest cities in the U.S. The study was limited to hurricane and tornado threats.  Unsurprisingly, many West Coast cities made the list, while none of the Gulf of Mexico cities did.

While these cities may be safe from hurricanes and tornadoes, I couldn’t help but think, “but what about forest fires, flash floods, mudslides, earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanoes, massive ice storms, snow storms, and severe heat waves?” Being an emergency responder, I could have taken this entire blog to list possible natural hazards and past disasters. In truth, no place offers 100 percent safety guaranteed. Each city and region comes with its own unique threats.

Do you have a personal or family emergency plan that includes a place to evacuate to and adequate food, water, medicine, and cash? During Hurricane Katrina, 1,833 people officially lost their life. More than a million people in the northern Gulf of Mexico had their lives significantly changed as a result of a storm that left $108 billion dollars in property damage.

Failure to recognize a threat, failure to have effective community, personal, and family emergency plans and supplies, and a failure to act often contribute to the very real human impact of a disaster. I personally didn’t know anyone who died during Katrina, but I knew people who lost everything and were rescued when they failed to evacuate. Be part of the solution and not part of the problem — make being ready for an emergency as natural as such disasters.

This is a post by OR&R's Charlie Henry, director of NOAA's Gulf of Mexico Disaster Response Center.

Related Links:

• To stay up-to-date on the latest storm warnings and advisories, visit the NWS Storm Prediction Center.
• To hear Charlie Henry talk about response efforts during Hurricane Katrina, listen to Episode 62 of the Diving Deeper podcast.
• For more information and resources to help you put together your family emergency plan, visit the National Weather Service.
• Download FEMA’s free Emergency Supply List.
• For disaster-specific preparedness information, visit Ready.gov.

More on Disaster Preparedness: 

• Disaster Preparedness: It’s Not a One Time Effort
• Preparing for the 2018 Hurricane Season at FEMA
• Preparing to Reduce Marine Debris During Hurricanes
• Restoring Natural Resources after Disasters: NOAA’s FAST Program Keeps Scientists Ready to Respond

The Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) in the Office of Response and Restoration works to prepare the National Ocean Service and its partners to respond to and recover from pollution events and natural disasters. One of the ways we achieve this objective is to provide training to complement that provided by our partners such as the National Weather Service and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The DPP has developed training on the science of coastal natural hazards and an Incident Command System 300 course for NOAA responders. In addition, the DPP provides support for exercises and drills to help NOAA and our partners familiarize themselves with these scenarios and identify areas for improvement to improve preparedness for a real event. The DPP participated in the last National Level Exercise on the NOS team and is currently working on an after-action report which will summarize the exercise and recommendations.

By Chris Landsea, National Hurricane Center

The 2017 hurricane season will long be remembered for the extreme devastation it caused in Texas, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and Florida as well as our neighbors in the Caribbean. While long-term recovery efforts continue, plans have to be readied for the soon-to-arrive hurricane season of 2018. No one knows how the United States will be affected by hurricanes this year, so plans must be prepared with the possibility that your community will be impacted.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), in conjunction with partners in other federal agencies such as the National Weather Service/National Hurricane Center and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as well as emergency managers at the state, county, and city levels, have been working diligently to prepare for the hurricane season. This is done through training and outreach events coordinated by FEMA’s National Hurricane Program. The National Hurricane Program’s mission is to provide technical assistance to emergency managers at local, state, tribal, territorial and federal government partners on: 

• Hurricane Preparedness Training;
• Response and Evacuation Planning; and
• Operational Decision Support.

During this past winter and spring, the National Hurricane Program provided critical training for emergency managers that will help them to make well-informed decisions for the next hurricane. These life and death decisions include ordering evacuations of residents away from the coast, closing schools, and preparing their communities from the hurricane winds, storm surge, fresh water flooding, and tornadoes. This “off-season,” emergency managers have had the opportunity to get new or refresher training about hurricane forecast and hazards, new Hurricane Evacuation Studies (led by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers ), and how to commence the decision making process when a hurricane threatens by applying the HURREVAC Decision Support Tool.

Training sessions this past winter and spring were held in many locations, including the National Hurricane Center in Miami, the FEMA Region III office in Philadelphia, and in several states including Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, Florida, and Texas. These trainings have resulted in hundreds of emergency managers receiving these crucial updates, and additional courses are scheduled for the summer. Such training is an annual necessity due to the availability of new forecast products by the National Weather Service /National Hurricane Center, revised Hurricane Evacuations Studies due to increasing populations along the coast, changes and updates to decision support tools and capability, and job turnover in the emergency management community. Trainings also promote the availability of operational decision support and technical assistance through FEMA’s Hurricane Liaison Team (HLT). The HLT is embedded at the National Hurricane Center and facilitates the rapid exchange of critical information between the NHC and the emergency management community.

In addition to the annual process of training, FEMA in 2018 led up a National Level Exercise for a simulated hurricane – “Cora” – that would hit the Virginia coast as a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale and also make a direct strike on Washington, D.C. FEMA’s National Exercise Division led the planning and execution of this large-scale exercise which was held from April 30 to May 11, 2018. (While the 2017 hurricane season was quite active, FEMA and Emergency Managers in Virginia, Maryland, and the District of Columbia were – fortunately – not directly affected. This National Level Exercise allowed emergency managers in those locations to test and execute their hurricane planning, response, and recovery actions.)

Simulated Cone graphical forecast for Hurricane Cora, used for the 2018 National Level Exercise. (This is NOT an actual hurricane, but is used for testing our nation’s preparedness for hurricane impacts.)

The purpose of this National Level Exercise 2018 was to examine the ability of all levels of government, private industry, and nongovernmental organizations to protect against, respond to, and recover from a major Mid-Atlantic hurricane with the following four themes:

• Pre-hurricane landfall protective actions;
• Sustained response in parallel with recovery planning;
• Continuity of government in a natural disaster; and
• Power outages and critical interdependencies.

It is through these detailed, realistic exercises that existing hurricane plans can be examined before the next storm threatens the United States. If gaps or problems are uncovered, they can be remedied so that FEMA and partners at the local, county, and state level can help people be safer and better prepared for when (not if) an actual hurricane comes to shore. It is also an opportunity to revisit lessons learned from the previous hurricane season and implement them during the exercise.

Moreover, the general public can and should become engaged with both hurricane preparedness training for your family and business. Here are some online options for learning more about hurricane hazards and how to be prepared down to the neighborhood level:

• Ready.gov (Plan ahead for disasters. Talk with your family.)
• Red Cross (The American Red Cross prevents and alleviates human suffering in the face of emergencies by mobilizing the power of volunteers and the generosity of donors.​)
• The FEMA App (Receive alerts from the National Weather Service for up to five locations. Get safety reminders, read tips to survive natural disasters, and customize your emergency checklist. Locate open shelters and where to talk to FEMA in person [or on the phone]. Upload and share your disaster photos to help first responders.)
• COMET (The COMET® Program is a world-wide leader in support of education and training for the environmental sciences, delivering scientifically relevant and instructionally progressive products and services.)

These efforts by FEMA’s National Hurricane Program and FEMA’s National Exercise Division are two of the ways that the nation will be more resilient the next time a hurricane threatens.

Chris Landsea with the National Hurricane Center wrote this blog. Chris had the unique opportunity through NOAA’s Leadership Competency Development Program to work at FEMAHeadquarters in Washington, D.C. for three months this winter. While at FEMA, he contributed to both the training conducted by the National Hurricane Program as well as developing the “ground truth” for Hurricane Cora’s simulated landfall into Virginia. Chris met and worked with the dedicated men and women in FEMA that work toward a shared mission of “Helping people before, during, and after disasters.”

“They truly embody this mission with their efforts to prepare the Emergency Management community with the tools and expertise to best deal with these catastrophic systems we call hurricanes,” Chris said. “The next time that the United States is hit by a landfalling hurricane whether in 2018 or the next season, the general public will be much better protected and prepared because of their efforts.”

More on Disaster Preparedness: 

• Disaster Preparedness: It’s Not a One Time Effort
• Natural Disasters are Part of Nature, Planning for Disasters Should be Just as Natural
• Preparing to Reduce Marine Debris During Hurricanes
• Restoring Natural Resources after Disasters: NOAA’s FAST Program Keeps Scientists Ready to Respond

Being ready for natural disasters is all about learning from the past, looking ahead to the future, and preparing in the now. Preparedness is not a one time effort. Disasters happen every year, and it’s important to make sure you’re ready — not just once, but throughout the year.

Natural disasters can take you off guard, if you let them. In all reality, natural disasters are not a complete surprise. They happen every year, and for some, we even have a general timeframe for when we might expect them — such as hurricane season. That knowledge affords us the incredible opportunity to be ready and prepared when the time comes.

Preparedness saves lives, it saves property, and it even saves the environment. Here at NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration, we have preparedness plans for all manner of possible incidents — ranging from natural to human-made disasters. This week, we’ll be sharing with you what we do to stay prepared, and we’ll even have some tips for how you can be prepared, too.

Glance Back

We all know that hindsight is 20/20, so why not use the past as a resource in planning for the future? By examining incidents and disasters that have happened before, we can learn from our experiences as well as the experiences of others.

Glancing back at last year, the 2017 hurricane season had only a fifth the lost of life of past seasons. This is an excellent example of learning from the past, as this number has been largely attributed to improved forecasts and warnings.

Though the loss of life was far less, the physical damage was twice that of previous years.

NOAA contributed more than 2,000 hours of collective on-scene support during last season’s hurricane response. OR&R, as part of the Hurricane Maria emergency Support Function #10 (ESF-10) team, helped with the vessel removal operations, primarily in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

In the U.S. Virgin Island, ESF-10 mitigated the pollution risks from a total of 480 displaced vessels, 3,668 hazardous chemical containers, and 309 batteries. A total of 12,449 gallons of fuel and oil waste was recovered. A total of 400 coral colonies were relocated.

In Puerto Rico, 377 sunken or beached vessels were reported. ESF-10 oversaw the removal of 260 vessels, contacted vessel owners, mitigated 37 pollution incidents, and removed 17,800 gallons of oily water.

During a crisis, human life is of course the priority of any response. When creating a preparedness plan, it’s important to also consider the environmental concerns associated with a disaster — including ways to mitigate potential pollution incidents in your home and on your property.

Look Ahead

When planning ahead for any given year, it’s important to pay close attention to the forecasts and other resources that are available.

According to NOAA’s forecasters, a near- or above-normal 2018 Atlantic hurricane season is expected. The Atlantic hurricane season, which extends from June 1 to November 30, is expected to have a 70 percent likelihood of 10 to 16 named storms (those with winds of 39 mph or higher). Of those, five to nine could become hurricanes — storms with winds of 74 mph or higher — including between one and four major hurricanes of a category 3, 4, or 5 and with winds of 111 mph or higher.

To put this in context, an average hurricane season produces 12 named storms, of which six become hurricanes — including three major hurricanes — which is how forecasters arrive at the prediction of “near-normal” or “above-normal.”

NOAA has also issued seasonal hurricane outlooks for the eastern and central Pacific basins. An 80 percent chance of a near- or above-normal season is predicted for both the eastern and central Pacific regions. The eastern Pacific outlook calls for a 70-percent probability of 14 to 20 named storms, of which seven to 12 are expected to become hurricanes, including three to seven major hurricanes. The central Pacific outlook calls for a 70-percent probability of three to six tropical cyclones, which includes tropical depressions, tropical storms and hurricanes.

An updated 2018 Atlantic seasonal outlook will be published in early August, just prior to the peak of the season. For more information on seasonal outlooks, stay tuned for tomorrow’s guest blog from the National Hurricane Center.

Prepare Now

OR&R prepares for disasters year-round through trainings and updating plans and response resources.

NOAA’s Gulf of Mexico Disaster Response Center (DRC) was established to expand the federal capacity to plan for and respond to hazards of all types — bringing together NOAA-wide resources to improve preparedness, planning, and response capacity for natural and human-caused disasters along the Gulf coast. Dedicated in 2012, the DRC has since become the bedrock for NOAA’s new Disaster Preparedness Program — a program to build on the DRC’s existing operational capabilities and knowledge to ensure that commerce, communities, and natural resources can recover from disasters as quickly as possible.

“Our county continues to face challenging and large scale natural and technological events such as last year's hurricanes and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The National Ocean Service is committed to a Disaster Preparedness Program, which builds upon NOAA's current operational capabilities and knowledge to ensure that our nation's communities and commerce will be better prepared in the event of a disaster,” said Dave Westerholm, director of NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration. “Through enhanced training, exercises, scientific tools and collaboration with federal, state and regional governments as well as our industry, academic and non-profit partners we can prepare for, respond to and recover from events more quickly and help protect life, property and our nation's valuable natural resources.”

OR&R’s scientific support coordinators provide training for responders throughout the year, and participate in local area committees, regional response teams, and geographic response teams. Part of training and planning to protect life, property, and the environment, is knowing what there is to protect.

By creating area contingency plans, responders can identify areas with sensitive habitats and provide protection strategies to assist with future responses. In Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands last year, more than 15,000 corals at over 50 sites were reattached. That’s why it’s important to have job aids and plans in place for how to deal with sensitive habitats, such as mangroves, marshes, and coral. Part of the training that is provided includes how to respond to a pollution-disaster based on the type of habitat that was impacted, resources at risk (including sensitive habitats and listed species), and the type of product that is causing the threat to natural resources.

OR&R also provides reference materials, such as the Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI), which provides summaries of coastal resources that are at risk if a pollution threat occurs. ESI maps identify the types of shoreline that are in an area, establish protection priorities based on the sensitivity of a habitat, and help to identify cleanup strategies. Updated ESI maps can provide responders with very current and relevant information to develop protection strategies before a product comes ashore or develop cleanup strategies that are appropriate for that particular area.

Part of preparing for the next hurricane season is repairing the damage from the previous season. Mangroves and marshes provide shoreline stabilization and can act as the first line of defense against hurricanes and other natural disasters. Restoring shorelines damaged by hurricanes is one way NOAA helps to prepare for future disasters — similar to how you should repair and fortify your house if it was damaged in a hurricane.

Are you ready for the 2018 hurricane season? Stay tuned this week for more information on OR&R’s preparedness efforts, as well as preparedness tips and resources you can use to get prepared for this year’s hurricane season.

More on Disaster Preparedness: 

• Preparing for the 2018 Hurricane Season at FEMA
• Natural Disasters are Part of Nature, Planning for Disasters Should be Just as Natural
• Preparing to Reduce Marine Debris During Hurricanes
• Restoring Natural Resources after Disasters: NOAA’s FAST Program Keeps Scientists Ready to Respond

As the regional coordinator for the Marine Debris Program’s Pacific Island Region, Mark Manuel currently leads efforts to address marine debris in Hawai‘i and the territories of American Samoa, Guam, and the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands.

The Hawaiian archipelago is prone to accumulating marine debris because of its central location in the North Pacific Gyre. Regional efforts center around working with local partners to address marine debris through removals and prevention by way of education and outreach.

Born and raised on the island of Hawai‘i, Mark has spent his life surrounded by the ocean cultivating his cultural, scientific, and recreational connections with it. Mark was inspired by a fellow Hawaiian marine science teacher who first introduced him to the field of marine science. He followed his love for the ocean in his educational pursuits earning a bachelor’s degree in marine science and a master’s degree in tropical conservation biology and environment science from the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo.

Prior to joining the Marine Debris Program in 2015, Mark held positions as a marine debris field technician, research specialist, and operations manager in the Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center’s Coral Reef Ecosystem Division. Through participation in a number of coral research expeditions throughout the Pacific including marine debris survey and removal efforts in the remote Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, Mark’s specialized background and experiences uniquely informs his current position within the Marine Debris Program.

“Because of the firsthand experience I had removing thousands of pounds of marine debris on our shorelines, I thought it was important to support the mission of the Marine Debris Program and ultimately join the team,” Mark said.

When asked about the challenges presented by his job, Mark notes the magnitude and complexity of the marine debris issue.

“We are experiencing ever increasing amounts of marine debris on our beloved shorelines and waters every year. Though it is a global issue, I am hopeful for our future as we know that solutions start locally and we are very lucky to have a Pacific community that is especially connected and caring of our oceans,” shared Mark.

Reflecting on the most rewarding aspects of his work, Mark notes the hopeful future he holds for his two young sons and the ocean.

“A Hawaiian proverb I hold dear is: he ali‘i ka ‘āina, he kauwā ke kanaka – the land is chief, man its servant. Practicing this concept through my work and guiding my sons, I am confident in the work we do and excited for the future stewards of the ocean that we are raising.”