NOV. 25, 2019 — On Nov. 13, 2019, John Tarpley, regional operations branch chief in the Emergency Response Division, received the prestigious Legacy Award at the Pacific States-British Columbia Oil Spill Task Force annual meeting in Bellingham, Washington.

NOVEMBER 18, 2019 — On Wednesday, November 6, the Gulf of Mexico Disaster Response Center (DRC0 in Mobile, Alabama hosted not one, but two distinguished guests - RDML Timothy Gallaudet, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, and CAPT van Westendorp, of the Office of Coast Survey, Navigation Services Division. 

NOVEMBER 18, 2019 — On November 6-7, 2019, members of the OR&R Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) and the OR&R Emergency Response Division attended the Regional Response Team 6 fall meeting in Addison, Texas.

On October 30-31, NOAA Marine Debris Program staff attended the Policy and Action on Plastic in the Arctic Ocean Workshop, co-hosted by The Harvard Kennedy School, The Wilson Center Polar Institute & the Icelandic Chairmanship of the Arctic Council. 

NOVEMBER 12, 2019 — For NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R), Fiscal Year 2019 was a year filled with new challenges and new achievements.

NOVEMBER 12, 2019 —The annual meeting of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) emphasized “the need for environmental scientists and managers from all sectors (e.g., academia, business, government, non-profit, non-governmental and intergovernmental organizations) to work together at a global scale to address shared environmental challenges.”

NOVEMBER 12, 2019 — In advance of the Clean Gulf Scientific Conference, the NOAA Satellite and Information Service (NESDIS) and OR&R collaborated to provide training on their products and services regarding marine oil pollution.

NOVEMBER 12, 2019 — During the week of October 28-31, ten scientists from NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration attended the Clean Gulf conference in New Orleans, Louisiana.

NOVEMBER 4, 2019 — SOLVE Oregon, in partnership with Oregon State Parks, launched a state-wise adopt-a-beach program.

NOVEMBER 4, 2019 — On October 17-18, the Marine Debris Program (MDP) participated and presented at the Lighthouse Lofoten conference in Svolvaer, Norway.

NOV. 4, 2019 — NOAA recently announced that Scott Lundgren will be taking the helm on Nov. 12 as director of NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration — NOAA’s office dedicated to preparedness, response, and restoration efforts to protect coastal resources from threats of oil, chemicals, marine debris, and natural disasters.

NOVEMBER 4, 2019 — Staff members from OR&R and the Office of Coast Survey recently enjoyed a visit from Russell Callender, former Assistant Administrator of NOAA’s National Ocean Service. In 2018, Dr. Callender was named as the new Director of Washington Sea Grant at the University of Washington in Seattle.

OCTOBER 28, 2019 —OR&R joined the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and public school teachers and students in Brooklyn, New York, on October 22 for the annual Day in the Life of the Hudson and Harbor event.

OCTOBER 28, 2019 — What can $28 million do to restore polluted waters across America? In the 2019 fiscal year, NOAA worked with our co-trustees to reach settlements to restore natural resources injured by pollution.

OCTOBER 28, 2019 — The 2018 literature review on the Effects of Pollution on Marine Organisms, authored by three OR&R scientists and partners, has been published in the October 2019 issue of Water Environment Research.

OCTOBER 28, 2019 — During the week of October 14, NOAA Marine Debris Program Research Coordinator, Carlie Herring, and NOAA Marine Debris Program Northeast Regional Coordinator, Demi Fox, participated in a research road trip through New England.

OCTOBER 21, 2019 — The groundbreaking of a new urban wetland in Wilmington, Delaware was held on October 18, at a gathering that included Delaware Governor John Carney, Senator Chris Coons, Mayor Mike Purzycki and other community leaders.

OCTOBER 21, 2019 — In early October, NOAA Marine Debris Program Division Chief, Nancy Wallace, attended the XPRIZE Visoneering event in Los Angeles. Attendees help XPRIZE refine and iterate how they tackle global challenges, learn from one another about breakthrough efforts being conducted across the world, and hear and experience new exponential technologies that are reshaping society.

OCTOBER 21, 2019 — A diverse array of stakeholders gathered to share information regarding scientific, economic and legal issues to advance the Natural Resource Damage Assessment practice. 

OCTOBER 14, 2019 — On October 1, 2019, OR&R Emergency Response Chief Scott Lundgren and OR&R Senior Scientist Lisa DiPinto met with representatives of ITOPF (formerly the International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation) at its headquarters in London.

OCTOBER 10, 2019 — A vessel that capsized early last month remains on its side in St. Simons Sound and continues to pose a pollution threat as responders work to remove the oil onboard. 

OCTOBER 7, 2019 — On October 1-2, the NOAA Marine Debris Program Pacific Regional Coordinator, Nir Barnea, participated in the Microplastic Monitoring Workshop, conducted at the Seattle Aquarium.

OCTOBER 7, 2019 — On September 30, NOAA Marine Debris Program’s (MDP) Northeast regional coordinator, Demi Fox, along with Kara Lavender Law, research professor of oceanography at Sea Education Association, and Stewart Harris, director of marine and environmental stewardship for the Plastics Division at American Chemistry Council, joined a panel at the University of Rhode Island’s first ever Plastics: Land to Sea Summit.

SEPTEMBER 28, 2019 — On September 19, the Marine Debris Program released its first biennial update to the 2017-2023 Oregon Marine Debris Action Plan.

SEPTEMBER 28, 2019 — On September 26, the NOAA Marine Debris Program released a study by Abt Associates, Inc., evaluating the effects of marine debris on beach recreation and regional economies in four coastal communities.

SEPTEMBER 23, 2019 — Based in Honolulu, Hawai’i, and born and raised on the island of O‘ahu, Shanelle grew up surrounded by the ocean and rich history the islands offer.

SEPTEMBER 23, 2019 — On August 28 and 29, the Great Lakes Marine Debris Community met in Toledo, Ohio to discuss progress to date on addressing marine debris in the Great Lakes region.

SEPTEMBER 16, 2019 — On September 11, the OR&R Emergency Response Division Chief and Senior Scientist participated in the 4th quarter FY2019 Interagency Coordinating Committee on Oil Pollution Research (ICCOPR) hosted by the University of Maryland’s Department of Fire Protection Engineering in College Park, Maryland.

SEPTEMBER 16, 2019 — On October 10, the Public Broadcasting System (PBS) will air a documentary, “The Serengeti Rules.”

SEPTEMBER 16, 2019 — OR&R participated in NOAA’s Environmental Data Management workshop held in Seattle, Washington on September 4-5.

SEPTEMBER 16, 2019 — On September 10, OR&R’s Tom Brosnan, Robb Wright, Simeon Hahn, and Megan Ewald participated in the Christina River Sediment Remediation Technical Workshop in Wilmington, Delaware. 

SEPT. 3, 2019 — Last week, scientists from NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration, in collaboration with an interdisciplinary and interagency team of researchers and oil spill responders, tested new tools and methods for characterizing oil slicks and oil in the water column following an oil spill.

AUGUST 26, 2019 — On August 6 and 7, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Region III and the Delaware Emergency Management Agency led a debris management training for emergency responders in Dover, Delaware.

AUGUST 26, 2019 — On August 13, the NOAA Marine Debris Program's California Regional Coordinator, Sherry Lippiatt, presented on marine debris prevention strategies at the California Resource Recovery Association Conference.

AUGUST 19, 2019 — On July 31, the National Ocean Service (NOS) Zero Waste Team, comprised of 13 representatives from NOS program offices and NOS headquarters, came together at the first Zero Waste Workshop in Silver Spring, Maryland.

AUGUST 19, 2019 — On August 8, the NOAA Marine Debris Program’s Director, Nancy Wallace, spoke to a group of seven foreign journalists from Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and Indonesia during a State Department-sponsored reporting tour covering American policy topics: "The U.S. Vision for the Indo-Pacific Region.”

AUGUST 19, 2019 — OR&R’s Simeon Hahn of the Assessment and Restoration Division organized and led the Delaware River Urban Water Federal Partnership meeting at the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC) office in Dover, Delaware, on Aug 7. 

AUGUST 12, 2019 — On July 25-26, over 50 researchers participated in the 2019 Hawai'i Marine Debris Action Plan Research Workshop, hosted by the NOAA Marine Debris Program and the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

AUGUST 5, 2019 — On July 30 -August 1, the OR&R Diversity and Inclusion committee (D&I) met in Silver Spring, Maryland, to develop an action plan for the next two years.

JULY 29, 2019 — On July 23, the NOAA Marine Debris Program’s (MDP) Northeast Regional Coordinator, Demi Fox, and Communications and Education Specialist, Jennifer Simms, led a workshop titled: How to Talk Trash: Lessons from NOAA’s Marine Debris Program at the annual National Marine Educators Association conference at the University of New Hampshire. 

JULY 29, 2019 — On July 23-25, OR&R’s Emergency Response Division conducted Shoreline Cleanup Assessment Techniques (SCAT) Team Member Training in the Arctic hosted by Alaska Clean Seas at their training facility in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.

JULY 22, 2019 — OR&R sponsored a NRDA (Natural Resource Damage Assessment) workshop through Coastal Response Research Center (CRRC) in Hawaii from July 16-18.

JULY 22, 2019 — On July 10 and 11, the NOAA Marine Debris Program’s Northeast Regional Coordinator, Demi Fox, attended a Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment meeting in Halifax, Nova Scotia to update the Council on U.S.-Canada collaborations to prevent and remove marine debris throughout the bi-national region.

JULY 19, 2019 — Oil recovery operations on a World War II-era shipwreck near Long Island, New York are now nearing completion after resulting in the removal of more than 450,000 gallons of oil over a period of nearly three months. 

JULY 15, 2019 — On June 26, the NOAA Marine Debris Program Pacific Northwest Coordinator joined 40 current and future Puget Sound Dungeness crabbers in a well-attended workshop to learn how to catch more crabs and lose less crab pots.

JULY 15, 2019 — On July 8 - 9, OR&R’s LT Michael Doig and LT Joshua Valdivia, of the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) provided spill response training for USCG Sector Sault Ste. Marie. This was the last of 5 classes conducted around USCG District 9. 

JULY 15, 2019 —The OR&R Emergency Response Division sponsored a June 25-26 workshop titled “Leveraging Science and Academic Engagement” in Tiburon, California.

JULY 1, 2019 — OR&R Emergency Response Division employees LCDR James Rosenberg and LTJG Matt Bissell visited three tribal nations (Quinault, Quileute, and Makah) the week of June 24 to provide oil spill response training to tribal members.

JULY 1, 2019 — During June 18-20, 2019,  the University of New Hampshire’s Coastal Response Research Center (CRCC) partnered with the Office of Response and Restoration’s Disaster Preparedness Program to hold NOAA’s 5th Regional Preparedness Workshop and Training (NRPT). 

JULY 1, 2019 — OR&R Emergency Response Chief Scott Lundgren, oceanographer Chris Barker, and chemist Dalina Thrift-Viveros participated in a meeting on June 11, 2019 to discuss hazard modeling roles, responsibilities, recent incident coordination, and future exercises and engagements.

JUNE 24, 2019 — On June 10-11 and 13-14, 2019, OR&R’s LT Michael Doig and LT Joshua Valdivia, of the U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) provided spill response training for USCG MSU (Marine Safety Unit) Duluth and Sector Lake Michigan.

JUNE 24, 2019 — During the week of June 10-14, 2019, in Brockport, New York, scientists from around the Great Lakes region gathered to discuss important lake-based issues, including marine debris.

JUNE 24, 2019 — Troy Baker, of OR&R’s Assessment & Restoration Division recently participated in a two-week exercise focused on modeling radiation doses in the terrestrial and aquatic environments. 

JUNE 24, 2019 — During the week of June 17, OR&R staff from the Emergency Response Division and the Gulf of Mexico Disaster Response Center held a four-day Science of Chemical Releases course in Seattle, Washington, at NOAA’s Western Regional Center and at the Institute of Ocean Science in Sidney, British Columbia.

JUNE 17, 2019 — On June 5 and 6, the Weeks Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR) hosted their annual Teachers on the Estuary (TOTE) workshop at the Weeks Bay NERR in Baldwin County, Alabama.

JUNE 17, 2019 — On June 4, the Marine Debris Program Director, Nancy Wallace, moderated an Ocean Plastics panel at the Blue Tech Expo in Washington, D.C.

JUNE 17, 2019 — On June 3-6, 2019, Doug Helton from OR&R’s Emergency Response Division joined the U.S. Coast Guard and the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) and Alaskan delegates in Bodø, Norway, for meetings with the Emergency Prevention, Preparedness and Response Working Group (EPPR).

JUNE 10, 2019 — The week of June 3, OR&R’s Assessment and Restoration Division partnered with the Hudson River Estuary Program/Hudson River National Estuarine Research Reserve at the Great Fish Count at Lemon Creek Park in Staten Island.

JUNE 10, 2019 — Last fall, OR&R had joined PS 146 3rd graders to clean up and remove over 700 pounds of trash from a 200 meter stretch of Plumb Beach at the mouth of Jamaica Bay in New York Harbor.

JUNE 3, 2019 — On May 21 and 22, the Marine Debris Program (MDP) hosted more than 65 partners for the Florida Marine Debris Reduction Workshop at the Nova Southeastern University Guy Harvey Oceanographic Center in Hollywood, Florida.

JUNE 3, 2019 — OR&R’s Emergency Response Division Chief, Scott Lundgren, met with the leadership of the American Salvage Association (ASA) on May 23.

JUNE 3, 2019 — The U.S. Department of the Interior’s International Technical Assistance Program (ITAP) together with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Commercial Law Development Program (CLDP) played host to the government of Argentina in New Orleans, Louisiana, on May 22-24 as part of its continued engagement on sustainable oil and gas sector development, as supported by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Energy Resources (DOS/ENR).

JUNE 3, 2019 — The Southeast and Caribbean NOAA Disaster Resilience Workshop was held May 14-16 at the Office for Coastal Management-Charleston.

MAY 28, 2019 — In early May, members of the CAMEO® software team attended the National Association of SARA Title III Program Officials (NASTTPO) conference to discuss CAMEO’s chemical emergency software and gain insights on the current needs and situations of planners across the nation.

MAY 28, 2019 — Oceanographers Christopher Barker and Dylan Righi visited the responders at the Sección de Respuesta a Emergencias (Emergency Response Section), ACP (Panama Canal Authority) May 21-23 to provide training and support for an updated version of NOAA's General NOAA Operational Modeling Environment (GNOME) model for the Panama Canal.

MAY 28, 2019 — NOAA Scientific Support Coordinator LCDR Jim Rosenberg participated in an oil spill response exercise in partnership with the U.S. Coast Guard, Washington Department of Ecology, and the British Columbia Ministry of Environment in the Strait of Juan de Fuca on May 22.

MAY 28, 2019 — On May 16, the Marine Debris Program's Pacific Northwest and California Regional Coordinators, Nir Barnea and Sherry Lippiatt, contributed to a webinar "Current Actions of the U.S. West Coast Marine Debris Plans," hosted by OCTO and the West Coast Marine Debris Alliance.

MAY 28, 2019 — To best prepare experts for oil spills where sea turtles could be impacted, NOAA has released “Guidelines for Oil Spill Response and Natural Resource Damage Assessment: Sea Turtles.”

MAY 20, 2019 — NOAA Scientific Support Coordinator (SSC) Adam Davis presented on the role of the NOAA SSC during the recent National Academies of Science and Gulf of Mexico Research Institute (GOMRI) co-sponsored workshop,  “Preparing for Oil Spills in the Eastern Gulf: health, economic resilience, and community well-being”. 

MAY 20, 2019 — The Marine Debris Program is excited to announce the winners of the third annual Ohio Marine Debris Challenge!

MAY 20, 2019 — At the most recent meeting of the RRT3 (consisting of representatives from the 15 federal agency and the states of Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia) the decision was made to perform courtesy visits to state capitols in an effort to educate state senior executives on the current dispersant pre-authorization memorandum of agreement (MOA).

MAY 20, 2019 —On May 13 and 14 OR&R participated in a coastal protection workshop conducted in coastal city of Tuy Hoa, Vietnam, as part of Pacific Partnership 2019.

MAY 20, 2019 — On April 8, Scott Lundgren, the OR&R Emergency Response Division Chief participated in a widely attended reception held by IPIECA, the global oil and gas industry association for advancing environmental and social performance, during the organization’s annual meeting. 

Last Updated: May 16, 2019

MAY 13, 2019 — After ongoing underwater assessment, the U.S. Coast Guard will be removing oil that has reportedly been leaking from a sunken World War II tanker near Long Island, New York.

MAY 13, 2019 — On April 30 and May 1, partners representing organizations in Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia gathered at the Greater Atlantic Regional Fisheries Office in Gloucester, Massachusetts to finalize the Gulf of Maine Marine Debris Action Plan, which aims to coordinate efforts to prevent, study, and remove marine debris.

MAY 13, 2019 — The Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) has started planning for FY2020! DPP staff gathered at the Disaster Response Center (DRC) May 7-9 for an FY2020 operational planning meeting.

MAY 13, 2019 — Since the 116th Congress began on January 3, 2019, several bills have been introduced that are relevant to the work of OR&R.

MAY 13, 2019 — The Department of Justice announced that a consent decree was lodged in the hazardous waste case of Exxon Mobil Former Fertilizer Plants. in Charleston, South Carolina.

MAY 6, 2019 — On April 23-24, Marine Debris Program Gulf of Mexico Regional Coordinator Caitlin Wessel visited Hurricane Harvey supplemental debris removal sites from Corpus Christi to Copano Bay, Texas. Caitlin met with groups impacted by Harvey, including the Mission Aransas National Estuarine Research Reserve, Texas General Lands Office (GLO), Goose Island State Park, and the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary.

MAY 6, 2019 — During April 23-25, trainers from the Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) and Genwest Systems Inc. provided the NOAA-specific Incident Command System 300 course in Charleston, South Carolina.

MAY 6, 2019 — On May 1, NOAA participated in the 2019 National Level Exercise, also known as Eagle Horizon. This year's exercise focused on devolution, or the agency's ability to transfer statutory authority and responsibility for essential functions from leadership and headquartered facilities to predetermined delegates in a remote facility, and to sustain that operational capability until leadership can safely and effectively resume authority and responsibility.

MAY 3, 2019 — On April 24, the OR&R Diversity and Inclusion Committee sponsored an event on how privilege (or the lack thereof) impacts our lives. Sociologists define privilege as unearned benefits that accrue to particular groups based on their location within a social hierarchy. Having privilege varies, depending on factors such as race, gender, sexual orientation, wealth or social status, and religion. While the subject has been the focus of much attention recently, it is not new.

APRIL 26, 2019 — Last week, the Marine Debris Program (MDP) celebrated Earth Day around the country.

APRIL 26, 2019 — On April 16-18, Adam Davis, LT Michael Doig, and Ed Levine attended the Clean Waterways conference in Cincinnati, Ohio.

APRIL 18, 2019 — On April 10, Marine Debris Program California Regional Coordinator, Sherry Lippiatt, was the invited speaker for the Sonoma Valley Rotary Club luncheon.

APRIL 19, 2019 — On April 10, Amy Holman, NOAA Regional Coordinator for Alaska led a remote NOAA communications exercise in support of Alaska Shield, a tri-annual state-wide emergency response exercise.

APRIL 19, 2019 — On April 16-18, 2019, staff from NOAA’s Assessment and Restoration Division, NOAA’s Restoration Center, and NOAA’s Office of General Counsel for Natural Resources participated in the biannual Texas Trustee Summit held in Port Aransas, Texas.

APRIL 19, 2019 — Ken Finkelstein attended the 2019 North Atlantic Chapter short course on April 8 at University of Massachusetts/Boston. 

APRIL 12, 2019 — On March 29, Sea Grant hosted an Oil Spill Workshop in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

APRIL 12, 2019 — Leah Moore, a Hollings Scholar, will be working at OR&R in Seattle this summer with the West Coast Branch of OR&R's Assessment and Restoration Division.

APRIL 5, 2019 — At the request of U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) Sector Puget Sound's Incident Management Division, OR&R personnel facilitated a group exercise at the USCG Air Station in Port Angeles, Washington on April 3.

APRIL 5, 2019 — During the week of March 25, NOAA OR&R staff held their annual Science of Oil Spill (SOS) training in Mobile, Alabama at NOAA’s Gulf of Mexico Disaster Response Center.

APRIL 5, 2019 — Last week, the Marine Debris Program’s Northeast Regional Coordinator, Demi Fox, spoke with a group of undergraduate MIT students at U.S. Coast Guard Sector Boston.

MARCH 29, 2019 — This week, leveraging our longstanding relationship with the Coastal Response Research Center at the University of New Hampshire, OR&R’s senior scientist collaborated with researchers from Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, the Environmental Protection Agency, Water Mapping LLC, and Sea Scan MK2 ECA Group on a project to calibrate various sensors under development for detecting and characterizing oil in the water column.

MARCH 29, 2019 — On March 26-28, NOAA's Emergency Response Division provided a three day oil spill response training to a variety of response and resource management agencies from around the San Francisco Bay area.

MARCH 22, 2019 — Working under the 2001 Memorandum of Agreement between the National Response Team and the Panama Canal Authority (in Spanish – Authoridad del Canal de Panama - ACP), OR&R’s Emergency Response Division (ERD) is collaborating to update the hydrography of the Canal Zone for trajectory model analysis.

MARCH 22, 2019 — OR&R’s Emergency Response Division Chief Scott Lundgren joined other members of the International Oil Spill Conference (IOSC) Executive Committee to plan the 2020 International Oil Spill Conference.

MARCH 22, 2019 — NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration and the Restoration Center presented at the “Gear Up” workshop, March 15 – 17, hosted by The Whale Museum in the San Juan Islands.

MARCH 8, 2019; UPDATED MARCH 25, 2019 — OR&R staff and scientists are busy preparing for a number of upcoming trainings for the U.S. Coast Guard and other response partners.

MARCH 15, 2019 — On March 9, 2019, the Marine Debris Program’s Gulf of Mexico Regional Coordinator, Caitlin Wessel, attended the Mobile Baykeeper’s post-Mardi Gras cleanup on One Mile Creek in downtown Mobile, Alabama.

MARCH 15, 2019 — On March 12-13, representatives of the Oregon marine debris community convened for the 2019 Oregon Marine Debris Action Plan Workshop.

MARCH 15, 2019 — The week of March 11, NOAA OR&R staff conducted oil spill science and response training in Hagatna, Guam for over 40 spill responders and planners.

MARCH 8, 2019 — On March 1, the Marine Debris Program’s Gulf of Mexico Regional Coordinator, Caitlin Wessel, attended the Alabama University System’s annual Sustainability Summit in Mobile, Alabama.

MARCH 8, 2019 — OR&R staff and scientists are busy preparing for a number of upcoming trainings for the U.S. Coast Guard and other response partners.

MARCH 1, 2019 – If you are an oil or chemical spill responder or planner seeking spill response training, here are more upcoming opportunities!

MARCH 1, 2019 — On February 27, the OR&R Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) Committee sponsored an event on mindfulness. Mindfulness is bringing one's awareness to the present moment, and has been proven to improve focus, reduce stress, enhance creativity, and improve physical health. The event provided an overview and history of mindfulness, the benefits, and tips for starting a mindfulness practice. Participants were guided through "body scan" and "raisin" exercises to experience the practice first-hand.

This feature is part of a monthly series profiling scientists and technicians who provide exemplary contributions to the mission of NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R). This month’s featured scientist is Catherine Berg, a scientific support coordinator in OR&R’s Emergency Response Division.

FEBRUARY 22, 2019 — On February 20, 2019, the Marine Debris Program released the 2018 Action Summary Report for the Great Lakes Land-Based Marine Debris Action Plan.

FEBRUARY 22, 2019 — Each year, the Alaska Forum on the Environment brings together a diverse audience to discuss ongoing and emerging environmental issues such as contaminants, hazardous waste cleanup, hazardous materials management, and pollution prevention within Alaska’s many different communities and regions.

FEBRUARY 15, 2019 — On February 13, 2019, Great Lakes Scientific Support Coordinator LT Michael Doig attended an oil in ice training course hosted by U.S. Coast Guard Sector Lake Michigan, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin with support from Canadian Pacific Railroad.

FEBRUARY 15, 2019 — On December 31, 2018, the Washington Coast Derelict Fishing Gear Removal Project came to a successful completion, meeting or exceeding its stated goals.

FEBRUARY 8, 2019 — The NOS Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) is offering a NOAA-specific ICS-300 (Incident Command System) class on April 23-25 in Charleston, South Carolina, that meets the requirements of the National Incident Management System (NIMS) used by federal agencies during expanding incidents as required by Executive Order.

FEBRUARY 8, 2019 — The Office of Response and Restoration had strong participation in this year’s Gulf of Mexico Oil Spills and Ecosystem Science Conference (GOMOSES).

The Guide outlines existing response structures at the local, state, and federal levels to facilitate a coordinated, well-managed, and immediate response to acute waterway debris incidents impacting coastal areas in the state of Texas.

FEBRUARY 8, 2019 — On December 12 and 13, the NOAA Marine Debris Program collaborated with the Gulf of Mexico Alliance (GOMA) and the Environmental Protection Agency to host more than 40 partners at the GOMA Marine Debris Mid-year Meeting and Workshop.

DECEMBER 21, 2018 — On December 18, the Marine Debris Program announced the release of its “Texas Marine Debris Emergency Response Guide.”

DECEMBER 14, 2018 — From December 3-7, the Marine Debris Program’s science team met with FY17 Marine Debris Research Grant recipient, Dr. Beth Polidoro, at Arizona State University to learn about an exciting microplastics project.

DECEMBER 14, 2018 — This week in Silver Spring, Maryland, OR&R’s Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) held a three day NOAA-Specific Incident Command System 300 Level Training (ICS 300).

DECEMBER 14, 2018 — In 2019, NOAA, along with representatives from three Tribal Nations, will begin to lead a project focused on aquatic restoration planning at the Hanford Nuclear site. 

DEC. 13, 2018 — NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration has staff on scene near Port Sulphur, Louisiana following an equipment failure on a wellhead casing in the Lake Washington-Rattlesnake Bayou area. The U.S. Coast Guard notified OR&R of the failure on Sunday, Dec. 9.

DECEMBER 7, 2018 — On November 30, the Disaster Preparedness Program activated accountability procedures for NOS staff within the projected area of impact (below from ERMA*) for the 7.0 Alaska earthquake, including the coastal tsunami warning area.

DECEMBER 7, 2018 — On November 29 and 30, the NOAA Marine Debris Program, in collaboration with the University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW), Marine Quest, and the NOAA Office for Coastal Management, hosted more than 50 partners at the Southeast Marine Debris Workshop.