Recent News and Events
April 2013
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Free Tours of the Santa Cruz Wharf
Come learn firsthand about some of the CeNCOOS supported work in Santa Cruz!
Free guided tours of the Santa Cruz Wharf are being offered year-round Saturdaysand Sundays at 1 and 3 PM. Docents from the Seymour Marine Discovery Center lead these guided 30-minute tours of science (both historical and current) at the wharf. The tours are part of the broader Green Wharf Project. The brochure and map (that includes self-guided smart phone tour instructions) can be found here.
At the wharf, CeNCOOS supports a water quality station and harmful algal bloom monitoring.
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Fellowship Announcement from California Sea Grant
California Sea Grant is now accepting applications for the Delta Science Fellows Program from qualified individuals to compete for predoctoral and postdoctoral research fellowship opportunities. More information on the fellowships can be found here.
Additional job announcements, funding and other opportunities can be found under News and Events on the Opportunities page. If you would like us to post an opportunity, send us an email.
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Annual Election Results Are In!
Our annual election to fill four seats on CeNCOOS’ 15-member Governing Council is complete. The newly elected members are:
Non-Profit Seat: Mary Miller (San Francisco Exploratorium)
Industry Seat: Greg Dale (Coast Seafoods, Inc.)
Educator Seat: Krista Kamer (CSU Council on Ocean Affairs Science and Tech)
Federal Government Seat: Eric Bjorkstedt (NOAA/NMFS Fisheries Ecology Division)
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AIS Product Update
The CeNCOOS AIS ship tracking product has been upgraded to include the recommended tracks through the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary for vessels carrying hazardous cargo in bulk and for vessels over 300 gross tons. The Transportation Separation Schemes (TSS) for the San Francisco and Los Angeles areas have also been added as a map layer.
March 2013
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San Francisco Bar Wave Buoy Moved to New Location
CDIP wave buoy 142 at the San Francisco Bar has been moved to a new location. The buoy was redeployed March 19, 2013 north of the shipping channel at 37.7917N, 122.6060W. More details are available in this public flyer and on the CDIP buoy website.
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CeNCOOS Welcomes a New Member to the Programmatic Team
We are happy to announce the addition of Aric Bickel to the CeNCOOS team. Aric will be working as a Program Manager in our MBARI office, splitting duties with Janine Scianna.
Aric joins us with a background and experience in Marine Policy, Strategic Planning, and Coral Reef/Watershed Management. He is new to the California region, having most recently worked with NOAA’s Coral Reef Conservation Program in the Northern Mariana Islands. He received a Master’s degree in Marine Affairs and Policy from the University of Miami (RSMAS), with a focus on Fisheries Management. We are excited to bring him aboard!
February 2013
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Governing Council Meetings
On October 24, 2012 and January 14, 2013, the Governing Council (GC) convened special working meetings to consider and provisionally adopt a framework decision making process for CeNCOOS business decisions. A subset of the Council formed an ad-hoc working committee to tee up the draft framework document for the full Council’s consideration. After two day-long meetings, the Council adopted several aspects of the framework document, including:
- Vision and Mission Statements
- CeNCOOS Principles, Activities, and Core Capabilities
- Assignment of decision-making authority to the GC and Program Director
- Methods for soliciting stakeholder input
- Considerations for establishing and periodically refining CeNCOOS program priorities
- Criteria for consideration of individual projects within established program priorities
Agendas, meeting summaries, and the provisionally adopted framework document can be accessed via the meeting links below:
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Erika McPhee-Shaw, CeNCOOS Governing Council Chair, Selected as 2013 Leopold Leadership Fellow
McPhee-Shaw was selected as one of 20 North American environmental researchers. The fellows were chosen for their outstanding qualifications as researchers, demonstrated leadership ability and strong interest in sharing their knowledge beyond traditional academic audiences.
Based at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment, the Leopold Leadership Program provides outstanding academic environmental researchers with skills and approaches for communicating and working with partners in NGOs, business, government and communities to integrate science into decision-making. They will receive intensive leadership and communications training to help them engage effectively with leaders in the public and private sectors who face complex decisions about sustainability and the environment.
December 2012
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Ocean Observing Training for Water Resources Control Board
CeNCOOS and their Southern California counterpart, SCCOOS, teamed up to lead three training sessions for CA State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) employees. The trainings have focused on how to access and use California’s ocean observing data sets, with a particular focus on harmful algal bloom monitoring, regional ocean models and drifter trajectory tools, surface currents, and underwater glider ocean profiles.
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CeNCOOS Governing Council meeting at Bodega Marina Laboratory
On December 10, 2012, the CeNCOOS Governing Council convened a meeting at the Bodega Marina Laboratory. Attendees included 41 participants from academia, non-profit organizations, state and federal government, and industry. The meeting comprised of program updates in the morning and a special afternoon session on high frequency radar planning. The agenda, a meeting summary, and meeting presentations can be accessed here.
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U.S. IOOS Summit Meeting
The IOOS Summit, held in November 2012, hosted over 200 participants, including seven from the CeNCOOS region. The purpose of the meeting was to evaluate progress made by the IOOS program in the last 10 years and create a vision for the next 10 years. A final report is scheduled for release in February. The meeting also included the unveiling of the NASA/JPL Independent Cost Estimate report, which outlined anticipated IOOS program costs for a 10-year build-out period and five years of operations.
November 2012
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CeNCOOS Governing Council Elects Executive Committee
Recently, the CeNCOOS Governing Council elected three members to its Executive Committee. The previous Chair has agreed to stay on and serve as Past-chair. The Committee composition is: Chair: Erika McPhee-Shaw, Moss Landing Marine Laboratories Chair-elect: Raphe Kudela, UC Santa Cruz Past-chair: Pat Coulston, CA Department of Fish and Wildlife At-large: Francisco Chavez, MBARI
We look forward to the leadership and guidance that the Committee will provide to CeNCOOS. Congratulations to those elected!
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CeNCOOS Governing Council to Hold Public Meeting
On December 10, 2012, the CeNCOOS Governing Council will convene a meeting at the Bodega Marina Laboratory in Bodega Bay, CA. All interested parties are invited to attend. The meeting will include program updates in the morning and a special session on high frequency radar planning in the afternoon. A draft agenda can be accessed here. RSVPs to the meeting are due November 26 to cencoos_communications@mbari.org.
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West Coast Entities Sign Agreement to Advance Ocean and Coastal Health Issues
The West Coast Governors Alliance on Ocean Health (WCGA) and the West Coast Coastal and Ocean Observing Systems (CeNCOOS, NANOOS, and SCCOOS) signed a two-year agreement in October to advance management of coastal and ocean resources. The WCGA is a state and federal partnership focused on protecting and managing ocean and coastal resources along the West Coast.The groups will collaborate on ocean observing systems addressing harmful algal blooms and ocean acidification and continue advancing surface current mapping and regional data framework efforts. Click here to read the full MOU.
August 2012
State of the Central California Coast Symposium
A public symposium for "Reflecting on the first 5 years of MPA Monitoring and Management" will be held Feb 27 - Mar 1, 2013 in Monterey, CA. The symposium will focus on a broad array of topics to build an understanding of ocean conditions in California’s Central Coast region inside and outside MPAs, and the ways in which we use and manage our ocean resources. The abstract submission deadline is September 30, 2012. For more information about the syposium check out the pdf flyer or go to the State of the California Coast website.
July 2012
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Second Year of CeNCOOS 5-year Grant Underway
On June 1, 2012, CeNCOOS began the 2nd year of a 5-year competitive grant from the U.S. IOOS® office. Year 2 funding of slightly over $2M has been distributed to 15 Principle Investigators and a supporting Program Office to continue and enhance ocean observing activities from Year 1. The work plan includes operation of automated coastal shore stations, a cross-shore glider transect, a radar surface current mapping network, and support for the operation of atmospheric and oceanic numerical models. New this year is a pilot effort to serve and integrate high resolution bathymetric data with other CeNCOOS data. UPDATE: CeNCOOS Governing Council Elections Completed
The annual election to fill five seats on CeNCOOS’ 15-member governing body is complete. CeNCOOS members elected Skyli McAfee from the California Ocean Science Trust to fill the non-profit seat and Kyle VanderLugt from Liquid Robotics, Inc. to fill the industry seat. In addition, Raphe Kudela (UC Santa Cruz), John Largier (UC Davis), and Dean Wendt (Cal Poly) were re-elected into three At-Large seats. Current Council membership is listed here.
June 2012
California Fish & Game Commission Completes Marine Protected Area Network
On June 6th, the California Fish & Game Commission approved and adopted regulations for the north coast MPAs, completing the network of MPAs in California’s open coastal waters. The network is the first in the U.S. to be designed from the ground up as a science-based network, rather than a patchwork of independent protected areas without specific goals and objectives. California’s Ocean Observing Systems stand poised to assist in providing and analyzing ocean data that are relevant to characterizing and monitoring California’s newly established MPAs. More details.
CeNCOOS Welcomes Intern Jason Adelaars
CeNCOOS is pleased to host Jason Adelaars as a summer intern. Jason is a recent graduate from the Coastal & Watershed Science and Policy Masters program at CSU Monterey Bay where he worked with Dr. James Lindholm at the Institute for Applied Marine Ecology (IfAME). Jason’s studies focused on continental shelf ecosystems along the central California coast. During his internship with CeNCOOS, Jason will be aggregating time-series of currents, sea surface temperature, ocean color and other parameters into composite layers, which can be used with geographic information systems to evaluate differences in oceanographic conditions across California’s network of MPAs.
April 2012
CeNCOOS Improves its Memorandum of Agreement
In April, CeNCOOS’ Governing Council approved revisions to its MOA, the CeNCOOS governing document. The more substantial revisions revolved around increasing diversity of the types of organizations represented on the Governing Council. The MOA can be read online here. Prospective members are welcomed to join CeNCOOS by reviewing and becoming a signatory to the MOA.- April 14, 2012: Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary Currents Symposium: From Lions to Luminescence at CSUMB in Seaside, CA.
