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2014 Life In Hampton Roads Survey, Part 5: Sea Level Rise And Environmental Risks, Public Affairs & News Bureau, Old Dominion University

News Items

[Introductory paragraphs]

The 2014 Life in Hampton Roads survey, conducted by the Old Dominion University Social Science Research Center (SSRC), contained an extensive battery of questions to determine how people in Hampton Roads felt about several environmental issues, with a major focus on sea level rise and flooding.

In all, 853 residents of Hampton Roads were interviewed over landline and cellular telephones for the fifth annual Life in Hampton Roads survey that was released this week in five parts.

The survey is designed to peer into social and economic indicators of quality of life in the region, with particular focus …

Microbial Community Assembly Found With Sponge Orange Band Disease In Xestospongia Muta (Giant Barrel Sponge), Rebecca Mulheron

HCNSO Student Theses and Dissertations

The giant barrel sponge, Xestospongia muta is an iconic and essential species of the coral reefs in South Florida. The sponge has primary roles providing ecosystem services and creating unique habitats for diverse microbial communities. On April 27, 2012 an outbreak of Sponge Orange Band Disease (SOB) was detected off the coast of South Florida. The disease begins with sponge bleaching, followed by mesohyl or “mesohyl” necrosis and often total mesohyl disintegration. Sampling from two diseased populations at Boynton Beach and Fort Lauderdale, FL took place on May 11th and May 29th, 2012. Each of the nine diseased sponges from …

Long-Term Stony Coral Transplantation Success Offshore Southeast, Florida, Usa, Theresa Elizabeth Robitaille

HCNSO Student Theses and Dissertations

Transplanted coral (Order: Scleractinia) colony condition was surveyed at five injury event sites, two coral nurseries, and one impact minimization location off the coast of Broward County, Florida, USA in 2012. Because stony corals are long-lived and slow growing, generally growing less than one centimeter in diameter per year, determining transplantation success requires long-term (greater than two years) monitoring. Long-term monitoring efforts, however, are rarely completed. This study is unique in that it examined stony coral transplantation success of several projects over a time period of 6-17 years. Control colonies were also surveyed in order to compare naturally growing coral …

Time, Money, And Melting Ice: Proposal For A Coopertive Study Of The World’S Cave Ice In A Race Against Climate Change, George Veni, Lewis Land, Aurel Perşoiu

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

Climate change is a global phenomenon that is melting and threatening to melt ice deposits in many of the world’s ice caves. The National Cave and Karst Research Institute of the USA is concerned that major and important paleoclimate and paleoenvironmental records stored in cave ice will soon be lost, and is proposing an international collaborative effort to overcome funding and logistical challenges to sample and analyze at least a representative collection of ice from several regions before further melting occurs.

Analysis Of Selected Climatologically Observations Of Talus & Gorge Ice Caves In New England, David Holmgren, Andreas Pflitsch

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

Changing temperature regimes inside a field of debris with year-round ice blocks are the base of this study in northern New Hampshire, USA. This unique ecosystem shows strong temperature anomalies in comparison to the surrounding area and ice, especially year-round ice, is not common below 700 m a.s.l. Yearly mean air temperatures can be strongly connected to the yearly ice level variations. Besides the analysis of the complete dataset of five years and a comparison of the impact of different seasons onto the ice considering precipitation, air temperature and special weather phenomena, the question about the use of talus & …

Climate Study In An Abandoned Auto Tunnel In Alaska, Usa, Andreas Pflitsch, David Holmgren

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

An abandoned auto tunnel in south central Alaska in an elevation of 118 m above sea level seemed to be a perfect laboratory for studying the evolution of ice speleothems in a yearly cycle. More than 1,500 ice forms like stalagmites, stalactites, columns in various shape and arrangements, developed in just 2 month to a high up to 6 meters and lasted for another 5 to 6 month. In October just the remains of the melted ice in rings and rectangular patterns of a white powder could be found. Unfortunately the mostly sealed tunnel was opened in January 2014 by …

The Monica (Monitoring Of Ice Within Caves) Project: A Multidisciplinary Approach For The Geophysical And Paleoclimatic Characterization Of Permanent Ice Deposits In The Southeastern Alps, Renato R. Colucci, Emanuele Forte, Barbara Stenni, Marco Basso Bondini, Mauro Colle Fontana, Costanza Del Gobbo, Daniele Fontana, Doriana Belligoi, Valter Maggi, Marco Filipazzi

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

On days 30 September and 1-2 October 2013, a 7.8 m long ice core has been extracted from a permanent ice cave deposit in the Southeastern Alps (Vasto’s cave, Mt.Canin - Julian Alps). Each 20 to 100 cm long section of the ice core have been immediately stored in plastic bags and preserved thanks to dry ice. The ice samples, thanks to the helicopter, has been subsequently brought on valley and promptly stored in a refrigerated van, made available by BoFrost. Thus the ice cores has been transported intact to the EUROCOLD laboratory in Milan. These operations have been carried …

Characterization Of Two Permanent Ice Cave Deposits In The Southeastern Alps (Italy) By Means Of Ground Penetrating Radar (Gpr), Renato R. Colucci, Daniele Fontana, Emanuele Forte

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

In order to assess the thickness and the inner structure of some permanent ice deposits in two high elevated alpine karstic caves of the Canin massif (Alpi Giulie, Italy), we performed several multi frequency Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) surveys. The surveys have been conducted within the project MONICA (MOnitoring of Ice within Caves), aimed at the paleoclimatic characterization of the considered cave ice deposits. GPR surveys have proved to be crucial also in finding the most suitable place for carrying out a drilling core. This has been particularly useful in the Vasto’s ice cave (VIC) in which the direct/visual estimation …

The Influence Of Karst Topography To Ice Cave Occurrence - Example Of Ledena Jama In Lomska Duliba (Croatia), Nenad Buzjak

The International Workshop on Ice Caves

The research of cave microclimate in general contributes to a better understanding of physical and chemical processes in complex karst geoecosystems. Special challenges for researchers are ice caves. This preliminary report is a part of the project dedicated to the research of deep caves on Velebit Mt. and pointed to the influence of the large karst depression microclimate to cave microclimate, e.g. ice and snow accumulation. The one year study using T/RH data loggers was conducted in Lomska duliba valley (Velebit Mt.) known for frequent temperature inversion and low air temperature, and in partially ice-snow filled Ledena jama (Ice shaft) …

Verification And Analysis Of Impact-Based Tornado Warnings In The Central Region Of The National Weather Service, Holly B. Obermeier

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Tornado warnings are one of the most critical products issued by the National Weather Service (NWS), and favorable verification statistics are desirable. The 2011 NWS statistics for traditional tornado warnings indicate that the probability of detection (POD) is 70%, while the false alarm rate (FAR) is 76%. The recent Joplin, Missouri EF5 tornado event on 22 May 2011, which resulted in massive devastation and loss of life, prompted the NWS to re-evaluate the current tornado warning format. After the Joplin, MO event, the Central Region of the NWS implemented the impact-based tornado warning (IBTW) experiment in 2013. IBTWs consist of …

Eastern Us Dryline Climatology And Synoptic-Scale Environment, Rebecca S. Duell

Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The dryline is an important focal point for convection initiation, and the subject of many studies. While the most common location for drylines is the southern Great Plains, dryline passages and subsequent severe weather outbreaks have been documented in the Mississippi River Valley and into portions of the southeastern United States. Little is known about these “eastern” drylines or how often they occur, as no climatologies or detailed studies have been published on them. This thesis presents a fifteen-year climatology (1999-2013) of eastern drylines in an effort to identify how often and where they typically occur, and to identify synoptic …

Effects Of Selective Grazing By Microzooplankton On Phytoplankton Composition In A Subtropical Estuary, Amanda Marie Mcgehee

Master's Theses

Rates of phytoplankton growth and microzooplankton grazing were measured at two locations within the Bay of St. Louis, MS, over the course of three months to explore the dynamics of the phytoplankton community. Community growth rates were estimated based on the changes in chlorophyll a (chl a) concentration using the dilution technique, (Landry and Hassett, 1982) and a C-specific rate was obtained using chl a labeling (Redalje and Laws, 1981). Concentrations of chl a were determined using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and fluorometry. HPLC was also employed to obtain class specific growth and grazing rates, using either marker pigments …

Methane Dynamics In St. Louis Bay, Mississippi, Hannah Marie Roberts

Master's Theses

A method of dissolved methane analysis was developed utilizing cavity ring-down spectroscopy and headspace equilibration. Samples of 70 mL were collected in 140 mL plastic syringes and equilibrated with a methane free headspace. Reproducibility was high (i.e. 4% typical RSD), and samples were successfully measured in the low nanomolar to high micromolar range. During method development, multiple research cruises were undertaken in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Stations included the Orca Basin, the Deepwater Horizon site, and the surrounding area. The Deepwater Horizon site showed no continuing leakage from October 2010 to June 2013. Samples collected from the northern Gulf …

Characterization Of Rain And Stormwater Nitrogen Inputs To The Mississippi Sound: A Landscape Approach, Joshua Michael Allen

Master's Theses

Urbanization in coastal watersheds is becoming an increasingly important issue in the world. Increased impervious surface cover, a factor of urbanization, has drawn more attention to stormwater runoff as a source of contamination to receiving waters. In this study, nitrogen species from rain and stormwater were analyzed across three different landscape types along the Mississippi Sound (hardened, residential, and pristine), as well as from drainage pipes that flow directly into to the Mississippi Sound. Nitrogen stable isotopes were used to trace the stormwater nitrogen to the surface waters and biota within the Sound.

The objective of this study was to …

Loggerhead Sea Turtle (Caretta Caretta) Hatchling Disorientation In Broward County, Florida, Allison Durland Donahou

HCNSO Student Theses and Dissertations

Hatchling disorientation after emergence is a major factor impacting sea turtle populations. This study utilized data from over 1,200 Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) Marine Turtle Disorientation Report forms from years 2006 to 2011 to assess changes in the severity and locations of disorientation events and the impact of municipal beach lighting ordinances. While the FWC forms were completed for all sea turtle species observed, this study focused only on loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta). A Disorientation Severity Index (DSI) was derived from the number of hatchlings and the direction of their tracks leaving the nests …

Repeated Multibeam Echosounder Hydrographic Surveys Of 15 Selected Bridge Crossings Along The Missouri River From Niobrara To Rulo, Nebraska, During The Flood Of 2011, Benjamin J. Dietsch, Brenda K. Densmore, Kellan R. Strauch

United States Geological Survey: Water Reports and Publications

In 2011, unprecedented flooding in the Missouri River prompted transportation agencies to increase the frequency of monitoring riverbed elevations near bridges that cross the Missouri River. Hydrographic surveys were completed in cooperation with the Nebraska Department of Roads, using a multibeam echosounder at 15 highway bridges spanning the Missouri River from Niobrara to Rulo, Nebraska during and after the extreme 2011 flood.

Evidence of bed elevation change near bridge piers was documented. The greatest amount of bed elevation change during the 2011 flood documented for this study occurred at the Burt County Missouri River Bridge at Decatur, Nebraska, where scour …

The Hard Winter Of 1880–1881: Climatological Context And Communication Via A Laura Ingalls Wilder Narrative, Barbara Boustead

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The Hard Winter of 1880-1881 was featured in the Laura Ingalls Wilder historical fiction account, The Long Winter, as well as in several town histories across the region. Both meteorological records and historical accounts indicate that the winter was particularly long, snowy, and cold. The question of how “hard” a winter is for a given location depends on the climatological context, which relies on an objective characterization of winter severity. The Accumulated Winter Season Severity Index (AWSSI) allows comparison of the winter of 1880-1881 among sites across the region, as well as in the context of the period of …

Integrating Land Cover Modeling And Adaptive Management To Conserve Endangered Species And Reduce Catastrophic Fire Risk, David Breininger, Brean Duncan, Mitchell Eaton, Fred Johnson, James Nichols

United States Geological Survey: Staff Publications

Land cover modeling is used to inform land management, but most often via a two-step process, where science informs how management alternatives can influence resources, and then, decision makers can use this information to make decisions. A more efficient process is to directly integrate science and decision-making, where science allows us to learn in order to better accomplish management objectives and is developed to address specific decisions. Co-development of management and science is especially productive when decisions are complicated by multiple objectives and impeded by uncertainty. Multiple objectives can be met by the specification of trade offs, and relevant uncertainty …

Using Temporal Changes In Drought Indices To Generate Probabilistic Drought Intensification Forecasts, Jason A. Otkin, Martha C. Anderson, Christopher Hain, Mark Svoboda

National Drought Mitigation Center: Faculty Publications

In this study, the potential utility of using rapid temporal changes in drought indices to provide early warning of an elevated risk for drought development over subseasonal time scales is assessed. Standardized change anomalies were computed each week during the 2000–13 growing seasons for drought indices depicting anomalies in evapotranspiration, precipitation, and soil moisture. A rapid change index (RCI) that encapsulates the accumulated magnitude of rapid changes in the weekly anomalies was computed each week for each drought index, and then a simple statistical method was used to convert the RCI values into drought intensification probabilities depicting the likelihood that …

A Geospatial Approach For Prioritizing Wind Farm Development In Northeast Nebraska, Usa, Adam Miller, Ruopu Li

School of Natural Resources: Faculty Publications

Being cleaner and climate friendly, wind energy has been increasingly utilized to meet the ever-growing global energy demands. In the State of Nebraska, USA, a wide gap exists between wind resource and actual energy production, and it is imperative to expand the wind energy development. Because of the formidable costs associated with wind energy development, the locations for new wind turbines need to be carefully selected to provide the greatest benefit for a given investment. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) have been widely used to identify the suitable wind farm locations. In this study, a GIS-based multi-criteria approach was developed to …

Hemispheric Comparison Of Cirrus Cloud Evolution Using In Situ Measurements In Hiaper Pole-To-Pole Observations, Minghui Diao, Mark Zondlo, Andrew Heymsfield, Stuart Beaton

Faculty Publications, Meteorology and Climate Science

The radiative forcing of cirrus clouds is highly sensitive to their microphysical properties as well as their evolution. However, there are very limited observations and analyses on the cirrus cloud formation and evolution with both microscale resolution and global scale coverage. The lack of such observations limits the overall comparison of cirrus cloud evolution between the two hemispheres. In fact, the previous hemispheric comparisons of cirrus cloud microphysics using in situ observations were only based on the sampling over two locations at 55°N and 55°S (Ovarlez et al., 2002; Gayet et al., 2004). Here we use a more comprehensive aircraft-based …

Final Period, James R. Fleming

Colby Magazine

Finding humor in the history of meteorology.

Timing Of Svalbard/Barents Sea Ice Sheet Decay During The Last Glacial Termination, Tasha Snow

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Arctic and North Atlantic underwent significant climactic changes since the Last Glacial Maximum (25,000 years before present (1950 AD); ka BP), but offsets in the timing of events between the two regions are poorly constrained due to age model uncertainties that arise from changing radiocarbon reservoir ages. Here, we use a relatively high-resolution, multi-proxy stable isotope and sedimentologic dataset from Eastern Fram Strait (ODP Leg 162 Site 986) marine sediments to constrain the timing of Svalbard/Barents Sea Ice Sheet decay and infer deglacial reservoir ages over the last 30 ka. We use magnetic susceptibility, inorganic and organic carbon, foraminiferal …

Northern Winter Climate Change: Assessment Of Uncertainty In Cmip5 Projections Related To Stratosphere-Troposhere Coupling, E. Manzini, A. Yu. Karpechko, J. Anstey, M. P. Baldwin, R. X. Black, C. Cagnazzo, N. Calvo, A. Charlton-Perez, B. Christiansen, Paolo Davini, E. Gerber, M. Giorgettta, L. Gray, S. C. Hardiman, Y. Y. Lee, D. R. Marsh, Brent A. Mcdaniel, A. Purich, A. A. Scaife, D. Shindell, S. W. Son, S. Watanabe, G. Zappa

Faculty Articles

Future changes in the stratospheric circulation could have an important impact on northern winter tropospheric climate change, given that sea level pressure (SLP) responds not only to tropospheric circulation variations but also to vertically coherent variations in troposphere-stratosphere circulation. Here we assess northern winter stratospheric change and its potential to influence surface climate change in the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project-Phase 5 (CMIP5) multimodel ensemble. In the stratosphere at high latitudes, an easterly change in zonally averaged zonal wind is found for the majority of the CMIP5 models, under the Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5 scenario. Comparable results are also found in …

Environmental Variability And Biodiversity Of Megabenthos On The Hebrides Terrace Seamount (Northeast Atlantic), Lea-Anne Henry, Johanne Vad, Helen S. Findlay, Javier Murillo, Rosanna Milligan, J. Murray Roberts

Marine & Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles

We present the first remotely operated vehicle investigation of megabenthic communities (1004–1695 m water depth) on the Hebrides Terrace Seamount (Northeast Atlantic). Conductivity-temperature-depth casts showed rapid light attenuation below the summit and an oceanographic regime on the flanks consistent with an internal tide, and high short-term variability in water temperature, salinity, light attenuation, aragonite and oxygen down to 1500 m deep. Minor changes in species composition (3–14%) were explained by changes in depth, substratum and oceanographic stability, whereas environmental variability explained substantially more variation in species richness (40–56%). Two peaks in species richness occurred, the first at 1300–1400 m where …

Odu's Toll Appointed To Governor's Climate Change Commission, Public Affairs & News Bureau, Old Dominion University

News Items

No abstract provided.

Sfa Weather Station-July 2014, Arthur Temple College Of Forestry And Agriculture, Stephen F. Austin State University

Weather Station Data

No abstract provided.

Sensitivity Of Mesoscale Modeling Of Smoke Direct Radiative Effect To The Emission Inventory: A Case Study In Northern Sub-Saharan African Region, Feng Zhang, Jun Wang, Charles Ichoku, Edward J. Hyer, Zhifeng Yang, Cui Ge, Shenjian Su, Xiaoyang Zhang, Shobha Kondragunta, Christine Wiedinmyer, Johannes W. Kaiser, Arlindo Da Silva

GSCE Faculty Publications

An ensemble approach is used to examine the sensitivity of smoke loading and smoke direct radiative effect in the atmosphere to uncertainties in smoke emission estimates. Seven different fire emission inventories are applied independently to WRF-Chem model (v3.5) with the same model configuration (excluding dust and other emission sources) over the northern sub-Saharan African (NSSA) biomass-burning region. Results for November and February 2010 are analyzed, respectively representing the start and end of the biomass burning season in the study region. For February 2010, estimates of total smoke emission vary by a factor of 12, but only differences by factors of …

Eyes In The Sky: Linking Satellite Oceanography And Biotelemetry To Explore Habitat Selection By Basking Sharks, Tobey H. Curtis, Stephan I. Zeeman, Erin L. Summers, Steven X. Cadrin, Gregory B. Skomal

Marine Sciences Faculty Publications

Background: Satellite-based oceanographic data products are a valuable source of information on potential resource availability for marine species. Satellite oceanography data may be particularly useful in biotelemetry studies on marine species that feed at low trophic levels, such as zooplanktivorous whales, sharks, and rays. The basking shark, Cetorhinus maximus, is a well-documented zooplanktivore in the western North Atlantic, yet little is known of its movements and spatial ecology in this region. A combination of satellite tag technologies were used to describe basking shark movements with respect to concurrent satellite-observed oceanographic conditions in order to test for selection of these …

Circulation, Vol. 19, No. 2, Center For Coastal Physical Oceanography, Old Dominion University

CCPO Circulation

Summer 2014 issue of CCPO Circulation featuring article "Meeting the Challenge of Climate Change" by Dr. Hans Peter Plag, Mitigation & Adaptation Research Insititue (MARI)