Ocean Science Blog

A Wakelet Twitter compilation of Esri's Ocean and Atmospheric GIS Forum, is now available. In addition, the opening plenary remarks entitled "Your Knowledge... Our Community... ONE Planet's Resilience" are available at esrirurl.com/forum19. 

As we begin both the Esri Ocean and Atmospheric Forum as well as the Seabed 2030 Map the Gaps Symposium, here is a Wakelet (essentially my notes and pictures) of last month's Nippon-GEBCO Seabed 2030 Vision-to-Action event in London. This includes a recap of the panel that I was asked to serve on with Andy Hoggarth of Teledyne CARIS, Almar Hollaar of QPS, and Wetherbee Dorshow of Earth Analytic. 

This meeting, which took place at the historic Royal Society on Tuesday 22 October, was convened to mark the progress made in the two years since Seabed 2030 was launched, and to look ahead to the remaining challenges of mapping the gaps in our understanding of the seafloor. In the short time that it has been operational, Seabed 2030 has already seen a doubling of the bathymetric data available to produce the definitive map of the world’s oceans – an increase equivalent in size to the landmass of the entire African continent.

The invitation-only roster of attendees included some of the world’s leading ocean scientists and maritime organizations, including representatives from the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) and the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of UNESCO. Also in attendance were delegates from industry partners such as Esri (Chief Scientist Dawn Wright and Maritime Program Manager + GEBCO TSCOM Vice Chair Caitlyn Raines), the XPRIZE Foundation, and the team behind SEA-KIT, the unmanned surface vessel (USV) which formed a key part of the GEBCO-Nippon Foundation Alumni Team’s winning entry in the Shell Ocean Discovery XPRIZE.

For additional info and notes see esriurl.com/visiontoaction and Seabed 2030's press release.

You've heard about the the Esri Ocean and Atmospheric GIS Forum taking place in Redlands, CA November 5-7, 2019... with a potent array of workshops, speakers, sponsors, and new insights for this growing community. As we expand our focus to include Atmospheric and MetOcean content, I'd like to share a few details of the Forum.

What to Expect: Three Powerful Days of Networking, Learning, and Collaborating.

On Tuesday, November 5th we will kick-off with warm welcome and overview of Esri's new scientific program support by Esri Chief Scientist Dawn Wright, followed directly by a Keynote Presentation from NOAA's Deputy Director of the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), Joseph Pica. Pica supports access to one of the most significant archives on earth, with comprehensive oceanic, atmospheric, and geophysical data from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and from million-year-old ice core records to near-real-time satellite images.

The morning will continue with a more technical presentation from Dr Sandy MacDonald, Director of Spire Weather, who will share how his organization identifies, tracks and predicts weather systems, and delivers these models and data via the ArcGIS platform. 

We will cap the morning off with an inspiring and informative presentation from Dr. Sylvia Earle, whose Mission Blue is recognizing, empowering and supporting individuals and communities around the world in their efforts to protect the ocean by documenting and mapping Hope Spots.

The afternoon will be continue with a series of concurrent presentation sessions from you and your peers! Topics will include weather and atmospheric modeling, fisheries, marine debris, seafloor mapping workflows and more. The day closes with a Social with drinks and munchies for all.

On Wednesday, November 6th we feature the Technical Plenary, where feature a unique set of Ocean and Atmospheric analysis demonstrations, with out-of-the-box functionality that will inspire your work across several application areas. The Tech Plenary is always a favorite of The Forum, and includes these topics this year:

• Machine Learning for Ocean Plastics
• Space Time Cubes
• Multidimensional analytical tools
• Map comparison workflows
• Applied Big Data analysis
• Data Automation

                                     The day will continue with Lightning Talks, and more concurrent sessions of Ocean and Atmospheric from you.

On the last day, Thursday Nov 7, we are offering several post-conference Workshops to choose from:

• Insights for ArcGIS with Ocean Data
• Field Operations and Story Maps
• Web AppBuilder and Configurable Apps
• Using Drone2Map
• ArcGIS Pro Basics for Science
• Advanced Analytical Workflows for Ocean and Atmospheric Scienc

Also attending are Business Partners, Distributors, and Esri staff, who will be presenting an amazing array of new applications and techniques that will define the state of Ocean and MetOcean GIS and forge your creativity in your work.

Looking forward to having you here at Esri headquarters and get involved by submitting a map, app, or paper—to inspire your peers from this thriving community of mutli-D GIS practitioners!

Registration for the Esri Ocean and Atmospheric GIS Forum in sunny Redlands, Nov 5-7 is still open! Paper deadline extended to 13 September! Don't miss out, especially at this critical time for oceans, weather & climate change! https://www.esri.com/…/about/events/ocean-gis-forum/overview #EsriOceanForum 

We are offering the most exciting Forum ever, with a potent array of workshops, speakers, sponsors, and new information and insights for this growing community. We are also extending a warm welcome (and focused content) to our Atmospheric and MetOcean users.

Our community is moving into new and profound areas, such as large scale bathy data collection and processing, 3D and 4D analytics, new applications for imagery, IoT, and big data processing at sea, and much more.

We are certain that attending this year’s Forum will inspire innovative approaches from proven best practices, which will help ‘close the gap’ between your work, and the solutions our people and planet require.

What to Expect: Three Powerful Days of Networking, Learning, and Collaborating.

After a welcome from Esri Chief Scientist Dawn Wright, and words of inspiration from Sylvia A. Earle (!!), Joseph A. Pica of the U.S. National Weather Service (NWS)(https://www.weather.gov/organization/pica-joseph) will present the keynote address on Tuesday, November 5. Pica serves as Deputy Director at the National Centers for Environmental Information, providing access to one of the most significant archives on earth, with comprehensive oceanic, atmospheric, and geophysical data from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun and from million-year-old ice core records to near-real-time satellite images.

The morning will continue with a short set of technical presentations from accomplished technology architects and thought leaders from both the atmospheric and ocean communities. 

On Wednesday, November 6th we feature the Technical Plenary, where feature a unique set of Ocean and Atmospheric analysis demonstrations, with out-of-the-box functionality that will inspire your work across several application areas. Included in the Tech Plenary topics are the following:

- Machine Learning for Ocean Plastics

- Space Time Cubes

- Multidimensional analytical tools

- Map comparison workflows

- Applied Big Data analysis

- Data Automation

We will have several post-conference workshops to choose from on Thursday, November 7:

- Insights for ArcGIS with Ocean Data

- Field Operations and Story Maps

- Web AppBuilder and Configurable Apps

- Using Drone2Map

- ArcGIS Pro Basics for Science

- Advanced Analytical Workflows for Ocean and Atmospheric Science

Also attending are business partners, distributors, and Esri staff, who will be presenting an amazing array of new applications and techniques that will define the state of Ocean and MetOcean GIS and forge your creativity in your work.

Please join us at Esri headquarters and get involved to inspire your peers from this thriving community of mutli-D GIS practitioners! Register today! http://www.esri.com/events/ocean 

Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Esri have come together for a Smart Oceans Panel at SXSW 2019, entitled Technology from Surf to Seafloor 

The demand for oceanographic data has never been greater—we need to understand how our coasts, open oceans, and coral reefs are changing if we are to preserve and efficiently utilize the ocean’s vast resources. Marine technology development must confront challenges such as turbulent waves, intense pressure at depth, and remote and (big) data transfer issues, for example. Now, more than ever, scientists and engineers need to make their complex discoveries accessible to broad audiences via high-tech data visualization and storytelling. This panel will explore innovative ways that technology development is advancing in the ocean—from the Internet-of-Things-enabled surfboard fin that aims to measure coastlines changing due to sea-level rise, ocean acidification, and more, to mapping technologies that `visualize and interpret the ocean from the sea surface to the seafloor.

The panel occurs Monday, March 11, 2019

Watch this space for a short recap.