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NOV. 12, 2024 — Over the past year, the NOAA Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) and the Coastal Response Research Center at the University of New Hampshire partnered with Louisiana Sea Grant to launch a series of resources to assist communities following natural disasters.
OR&R Weekly Report
The Office of Response and Restoration publishes this weekly round-up of news and information of interest to our partners, stakeholders, and team members. Click to subscribe
NOV. 12, 2024 — Staff from the NOAA Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) Assessment and Restoration Division and Emergency Response Division attended the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) North America annual conference in Fort Worth, Texas from October 20–24, 2024. Attended by more than 1,500 scientists, the conference included 1,088 presentations—21 of which were co-authored by NOAA scientists—across 184 scientific sessions.
NOV. 12, 2024 — The NOAA Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) welcomed four interns from the University of Maryland Eastern Shore (UMES): Jalynn Aaron and Kayla Brown, both majoring in psychology, and Mikaela Blackwood and Amari Dupree, both majoring in biology. From this November 2024 through April 2025, interns will remotely support OR&R’s Assessment and Restoration Division with work on natural resource damage assessment and restoration.
February 2022
FEB. 14, 2022 — In early February, the Marine Debris Program welcomed Benjamin Frey as a 2022 Knauss Fellow. The Knauss fellowship provides a unique educational and professional experience to graduate students who have an interest in the ocean, coastal, and Great Lakes resources, and in the national policy decisions affecting those resources.
FEB. 14, 2022 — On Feb. 14, 2022, the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, is scheduled to visit a NOAA Marine Debris Program funded project site in Tijuana, Mexico. The project is being implemented by the nongovernmental organization, WILDCOAST, to reduce the amount of marine debris entering the Tijuana River from the Los Laureles Canyon tributary in Mexico.
FEB. 7, 2022 – On January 25-26, 2022 the Gulf of Mexico Alliance’s Marine Debris Cross Team Initiative held its annual two-day meeting to bring together entities across the Gulf that currently address marine debris issues.
FEB. 7, 2022 — NOAA’s scientific support coordinator in the Great Lakes, LT Rachel Pryor, hosted two webinars in recent weeks.
FEB. 7, 2022 — As we closed out the fully virtual 2022 Alaska Marine Science Symposium, the Alaska Ocean Observing System (AOOS) and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) hosted a unique webinar, convening U.S. and Russian experts to share information on fish populations in our shared (and neighboring) seas.
Disaster Preparedness Program Holds Incident Management Team 101 Training for National Ocean Service
FEB. 7, 2022 — OR&R's Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) held their National Ocean Service (NOS) Incident Management Team (IMT) 101 Training on Tuesday, January 25, 2022. The training included six modules specifically designed to provide NOS IMT members with an overview of their roles and responsibilities, as well as information on response management systems, tools, and best practices useful in managing all-hazards disasters.
OR&R, NOAA Provide Mission Support for Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute Underwater Vehicle Mission
FEB. 7, 2022 — Staff across several NOAA offices, including OR&R, recently supported scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) who remotely piloted a Long-Range Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (LRAUV) to a leaking shipwreck for further study.
January 2022
JAN. 31, 2022 — On Jan. 19, 2022, the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Delaware Bay Area Committee hosted a wind farm workshop for federal, state, and local government agencies, along with industry and nongovernmental environmental organization partners.
JAN 31, 2022 — It's a sight that nobody wants to encounter: an oil spill at your favorite local stretch of coastline. You may immediately think of the sea turtles trying to nest on the beach, but there is much more to protect than meets the eye.
JAN. 31, 2022 — On Jan. 13, NOAA Marine Debris Program’s Mid-Atlantic Regional Coordinator Katie Morgan provided a virtual presentation and Q&A session to more than 120 fifth grade students across six classrooms at Spring Hill Elementary School in Virginia.
Jan. 24, 2022 – On Jan. 18, 2022, a $15.3 million settlement was finalized in Federal District Court to restore natural resources damaged from the 2014 Texas City Y oil spill in Galveston Bay, Texas.
Jan. 24, 2022 – On Nov. 4, 2021 a settlement was finalized to resolve the liability of a dozen public utility companies for injuries to natural resources stemming from hazardous waste pollution at the Metal Bank Superfund site on the Delaware River in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Jan. 24, 2022 – The Disaster Preparedness Program (DPP) has selected nine projects submitted by the National Ocean Service (NOS) programs for funding as part of the “Lagniappe Awards.”
JAN. 18, 2022 — Recently, NOAA and the Environmental Protection Agency jointly released their annual updates for CAMEO Data Manager and Tier2 Submit™, two programs that aid state and local emergency planners in preparing for and responding to chemical emergencies.
JAN. 18, 2022 — On Jan. 10, the Marine Debris Program hosted an information-sharing webinar for grant applicants. The goal of this webinar was to communicate the expectations for invited full proposal submissions to the MDP’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 Prevention funding opportunity, provide clarity on what applicants could expect during the application submission process, and share the anticipated timeline and an overview of the competition and award process.
JAN. 18, 2022 — The You Don't Know What You Don't Know Lecture Series from the Office of Response and Restoration kicks off its third year this week with a presentation from Nicolle Rutherford on the Environmental Sensitivity Index program.
JAN. 18, 2022 – The NOAA Marine Debris Program is excited to announce that recordings for all the Salvaging Solutions to Abandoned and Derelict Vessels monthly webinar topics are now available on our webpage.
JAN. 10, 2022 — On Dec. 20, 2021, a settlement was proposed in Federal District Court to resolve claims related to the Taylor Energy Platform oil spill at Mississippi Canyon 20 (“MC-20”). $16.5 million of this settlement is to restore natural resources injured by the spill.
JAN. 10, 2022 — Researchers from the NOAA National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) and Oregon State University recently completed field operations in support of the NOAA Office of Marine and Aviation Operations Office of Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) Program-funded project "Using Unmanned Aircraft Systems, Machine Learning, and Polarimetric Imaging to Develop a System for Enhanced Marine Debris Detection and Removal."
December 2021
Disaster Preparedness Program and National Estuarine Research Reserves Team Up for Tabletop Exercise
DEC. 20, 2021 — On Dec. 8-9, staff from the Office of Response and Restoration Disaster Preparedness Program and the Great Bay (New Hampshire) and Wells (Maine) National Estuarine Research Reserves walked through a tabletop exercise designed to test the Research Reserves’ Disaster Response Plans.
DEC. 20, 2021 — The Office of Response and Restoration released a report on Nov. 20 detailing the proceedings and recommendations of last year’s workshop on the Next Generation of the Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI) program and products
DEC. 20, 2021 — Last month, Peter Murphy, Alaska Regional Coordinator for the NOAA Marine Debris Program, participated in a session focused on the issue of marine debris as part of the Alaska Tribal Conference on Environmental Management (ATCEM).
DEC. 20, 2021 —Former OR&R scientific support coordinators (SSCs) Steve Lehmann and Ann Hayward Walker recently participated in several of ExxonMobil’s 2021 "Oil Spill Response Knowledge Transfer Webinars," a series brought back after its success last year.
DEC. 20, 2021 — On Dec. 9, members of the Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment and its working group gathered virtually to share updates, review new work plans, and identify areas for collaboration.
Marine Debris Program Hosts Informational Webinar for Invited Applicants to FY22 Removal Competition
DEC. 20, 2021 — On Dec. 6, the NOAA Marine Debris Program (MDP) hosted an information-sharing webinar for grant applicants.
DEC. 20, 2021 — On Dec. 3, 2021, a $15.3 million settlement was proposed in Federal District Court to restore natural resources damaged from the 2014 Texas City Y oil spill in Galveston Bay, Texas.
DECEMBER 13, 2021 ─ December 3, 2021 -- As part of efforts under the Southeast Marine Debris Action Plan, the Wildlife and Habitat Impacts Working Group developed a new tool, Tangled in Trash: A Reporting Tool For Wildlife, with funding from the NOAA Marine Debris Program and National Marine Sanctuary Foundation.
DECEMBER 13, 2021 ─ On December 1, 2021, the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) released a report on the United States’ contributions to global ocean plastic waste.
NOVEMBER 13, 2021 ─ The 2022 virtual Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference is the latest in a long history of regional gatherings about the inland seas of Washington and southern British Columbia, collectively known as the Salish Sea.