Flowing through southeastern Washington is an approximately 50 mile stretch of the Columbia River known as the Hanford Reach. This unique section of the river is an important habitat for fish and wildlife, including Chinook salmon. This area also served as the birthplace of the atomic bomb at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation.

This feature is part of a monthly series profiling scientists and technicians who provide exemplary contributions to the mission of NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R). This month’s featured scientist is Gary Shigenaka, a marine biologist in OR&R’s Emergency Response Division.

On July 3, while visiting in the Philadelphia area, I was invited to join the staff of Gloucester City Sail on the North Wind schooner as a photographer for the day. The nonprofit provides students from local summer programs the opportunity to learn about the waterfronts of Camden, New Jersey, and Philadelphia while on board the schooner, sailing on the Delaware River. They learn about the water quality, the history, and the industries that run along the river, which includes a major port. The 57-foot schooner they use as a classroom was built in 1995 and features five sails.

The government can’t stop working just because of an emergency. This means that federal agencies need to be prepared, with plans that account for every situation, to ensure our jobs always get done. This is called comprehensive continuity planning. 

Every month our Emergency Response Division provides scientific expertise and services to the U.S. Coast Guard on everything from running oil spill trajectories to model where the spill may spread, to possible effects on wildlife and fisheries and estimates on how long the oil may stay in the environment.

This month OR&R responded to 17 incidents, including oil discharges, sunken vessels, and a blue whale carcass.  

This blog was written by Kavya Varkey, a high school student from the Seattle area who interned with OR&R in the summer of 2018. Kavya was instrumental in developing the new story map on the Lower Duwamish River Superfund site. An urban river with a history of industrial pollution that began in the 1900s, the Lower Duwamish River continues to undergo both cleanup and restoration efforts. To learn more, view the new story map here. 

When the phone rings at OR&R’s Emergency Response Division, it’s usually for an oil spill — but not always. OR&R supports incident responses in a number of ways, one of which is to provide trajectories and model where the oil will go. But what about for something other than oil? What happens when one of the ocean’s largest inhabitants washes up on shore? OR&R’s modeling capabilities are again called upon to help decide what to do next. 

A remnant of the Ice Age, Glacier Bay Park and Preserve sits between the Gulf of Alaska and Canada at the northernmost section of the southeastern Alaska coastline. As its name suggests, Glacier Bay is home to thousands of glaciers, though centuries ago, a single tidewater glacier stretched across the whole of Glacier Bay. By the mid-18th century, the ice began to retreat and has continued to withdraw nearly 60 miles in total over the past two and a half centuries.