First iPhone/iPad application for the Marine GeoGarage

The first iPhone/iPad universal application -built as the Marine GeoGarage alter ego app for sailing- is available on the AppStore right now :

Marine NZ displays all New Zealand nautical charts online from GeoGarage servers with the ability to use them offline with previously browsed tiles cache.

Click here to learn more about Marine GeoGarage for iPhone/iPad including a demo video.

Action to save Baltic Sea is lagging

From TerraDaily

Action to save the Baltic Sea is lagging far behind schedule, environmental group WWF said Wednesday, a day before regional ministers are to meet on the protection of the highly polluted sea in Moscow.
"Efforts by coastal states to implement the common programme of action for the Baltic Sea are well behind schedule and schedules are being pushed further forward," WWF said in a statement, citing a monitoring report it commissioned from Gaia Consulting.

Even simple measures, like replacing phosphates in detergents with other, harmless components to prevent the hazardous overconcentration of nutrients had been pushed back in most of the countries surrounding the Baltic, WWF said.

Eutrophication, or the overconcentration of nutrients caused by sewage and agricultural run-off into the water, is seen as one of the biggest environmental problems for the shallow, semi-enclosed and brackish Baltic Sea.

The environment ministers of countries surrounding it -- Russia, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia -- are due to meet in Moscow on Thursday to discuss the current state of the ailing sea and efforts to restore its ecological status.

In 2007, the countries committed to the Baltic Sea Action Plan of measures aimed at protecting and restoring it to good status by 2021, and in February regional leaders pledged action, but WWF said many of the efforts were delayed.

"The strength and the idea of the Action Plan is that the same Baltic Sea protection measures are implemented in all coastal states simultaneously to generate a significant combined impact," Sampsa Vilhunen, head of WWF Finland's marine programme said in the statement.

"However, it looks like the programme is being implemented in a fragmented way and action is marked by the principle of the lowest common denominator: when one party stalls, the whole effort is easily slowed down," he said.

For example, while more than 10 percent of the Baltic Sea is already considered a marine protection area, the protected areas do not yet form a unified conservation network, according to the report.

WWF said the time for rhetoric was over and urged ministers in Moscow to outline new, concrete actions to save the Baltic.

Links :

• WWF : Seven steps to save the Baltic Sea / Scorecard / Detox Campaign
  
• Baltic Sea 2020
• Reuters : Baltic Sea states seek clean-up; Russia expands oil
  
• ScienceDaily : Cruise-liner sewage adds to Baltic decline
  

Gulf of Mexico oil spill in the Loop Current towards Florida

From ESA (19 May)

Scientists monitoring the US oil spill with ESA’s Envisat radar satellite say that it has entered the Loop Current, a powerful conveyor belt that flows clockwise around the Gulf of Mexico towards Florida.

"With these images from space, we have visible proof that at least oil from the surface of the water has reached the current," said Dr Bertrand Chapron of Ifremer, the French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea.
Dr Chapron and Dr Fabrice Collard of France's CLS have been combining surface roughness and current flow information with Envisat Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) data of the area to monitor the proximity of the oil to the current.

In the ASAR image above, acquired on 18 May, a long tendril of the oil spill (outlined in white) extends down into the Loop Current (red arrow).

"We performed advanced processing methods on the images to display surface features like variations in roughness and velocity, which provides insight into the spatial structure of the spill and its transport by surface currents," Dr Collard explained.

From the ASAR images of 12 May and 15 May, the oil spill was observed stretching increasingly closer to the Loop Current, raising concerns that it could reach the current and be carried south towards coral reefs in the Florida Keys.

"Now that oil has entered the Loop Current, it is likely to reach Florida within six days," Dr Chapron said. "Since Envisat ASAR, ERS-2 and other SAR satellites are systematically planned to acquire data over the area, we will monitor the situation continuously."

The scientists warn however that since the Loop Current is a very intense, deep ocean current, its turbulent waters will accelerate the mixing of the oil and water in the coming days.

"This might remove the oil film on the surface and prevent us from tracking it with satellites, but the pollution is likely to affect the coral reef marine ecosystem," Dr Collard said.

Combined efforts using satellite imagery and in-situ measurements of collected water samples will help to assess whether oil is in the deep waters of the ocean.

The Loop Current joins the Gulf Stream — the northern hemisphere’s most important ocean-current system — sparking fears that oil could enter this system and be carried up to the US East Coast.

Links :

• ESA's Envisat monitors the evolution of the oil spill : 27 April / 30 April / 3 May / 5 May
• New York Times
  
• National Geographic
• Roffer's Ocean Fishing Forecasting Service Deepwater Horizon Rig oil spill monitoring
• Ocean Circulation Group, oil spill trajectory hindcast/forecast : with winds / surface currents
• Florida's coral reefs
• ESA Envisat/Meris image
  

Glowing life in an underwater world

Awak’d before the rushing prow,
The mimic fires of ocean glow,
Those lightnings of the wave;
Wild sparkles crest the broken tides,
And flashing round, the vessel’s sides
With elfish luster lave;
While far behind, their livid light
To the dark billows of the night
A blooming splendour gave

From Lord of the Isles (1815) by Sir Walter Scott

Some 80 to 90 percent of undersea creatures make light -- from headlights on fish to incredible spiraling light shows on jellyfish, we know so very little about how or why it happens. Bioluminescence expert Edith Widder explores this glowing, sparkling, luminous world, sharing glorious images and insight into the unseen depths (and brights) of the ocean.

Edith Widder spoke on the Mission Blue voyage in the Galapagos Islands about her passion – bioluminescence.
Bioluminescence is the light chemically produced by many organisms found in the deep ocean. Not only is she is a specialist, but she has also helped design and invent new submersible instruments and equipment to study bioluminescence and enable unobtrusive observation of deep-sea environments.
One of these instruments, the Eye in the Sea observatory, has produced footage of rare sharks, squid, and never-before-seen bioluminescent displays.

In 2005 she founded the Ocean Research & Conservation Association (ORCA), which is dedicated to protecting aquatic ecosystems and the species they sustain through the development of innovative technologies and science-based conservation action.
In an effort to protect and revitalize the ocean she loves she has been focusing on developing tools for finding and tracking pollution -- a major threat to all of our water ecosystems and ultimately to human health.

Dr. Widder, who is also a winner of a MacArthur Fellowship “genius” 2006 award, received the prestigious invitation to give a TED talk due to her long track record of pioneering work in marine exploration and conservation.
“I’m thrilled. I’m ecstatic. It’s so wonderful to be included in such an energetic group. We’ve had a lot of depressing talks about the ocean and I can do that. But, I want to get you excited about all the things in the ocean that are yet to be explored.”

Links :

• Nature : the beauty of ugly interview
• Blue Planet - BBC Earth : Amazing and weird creatures exhibit bioluminescence
• Dive in the abyss
• TED : David Gallo on life in the deep oceans
  

GPS status updated, higher accuracy expected

Ground tracks of 30 NAVSTAR GPS satellites. The time span covered by each ground track is five hours (time rate is 1000x real time).

This month, the first Block IIF GPS satellite will launch from Cape Canaveral.
It will be the fist of 12 new ones, which U.S. Air Force ordered at Boeing and this campaign is a part of the GPS Modernization Program.

Boeing delivered also the 39 other SV's (Block I and Block II/IIA).
The new GPS IIF features twice the navigational accuracy of the current satellites (advanced atomic clocks greatly improving performance and giving the control segment greater visibility into the health of the units) and should deliver more robust signals for aviation and SAR (probably also for Photogrammetry and Surveyors), meaning the new L5 signal.
The new Block of SV's id designed for a 12 years life time period.
Navstar GPS Block IIF will be the end of the current generation of GPS satellites.
Actually, these new satellites each transmit three civilian GPS signals (we’ve typically been making do with just one for years) including a military-strength transmission that should enable autopilots to land with zero visibility.
A three-signal world will mean always-on GPS that’s accurate to within 3 feet (even indoors and in concrete urban canyons).

An official military announcement also laid out the 24+3 (“Expandable 24”) consisting to move three existing GPS satellites to new orbit locations will have a profound effect on GPS capabilities for all civil, commercial, and military users worldwide.

In the future, the next-generation GPS system (Block IIIA) will introduce new capabilities to meet higher demands of military and civilian users.
The system is looking ahead to its first launch in 2013.
Note : Galileo is still coming up (2014)
Block IIIA will offer the opportunity for a cross-linked command and control architecture, allowing the entire GPS constellation to be updated from a single ground station instead of waiting for each satellite to orbit into view of a ground antenna.
Block IIIA will also support a new L1C civil signal, and a spot beam antenna that provides resistance to hostile jamming while improving its accuracy and integrity.

Links :

• GPS
• GPS modernization
• Next stage of GPS