# Presentation: 264323

## James Acker 

- James Acker
- Goddard Earth Sciences DAAC,
- Ocean Color Data Support Team, SSAI
- acker@daac.gsfc.nasa.gov
- Wayne Esaias, MODIS Oceans Team Lead
- Gene Feldman, SeaWiFS Project Manager
- Steve Kempler, Goddard Earth Sciences DAAC Head

- COLORING THE COASTAL ZONE:
- SeaWiFS AND MODIS DATA
- FOR AQUATIC RESOURCES MANAGEMENT

**Detection of Hazardous Blooms and Eutrophication/Nutrient Excess**

- True-color MODIS image acquired on January 30, 2002, showing a strange “black water” phytoplankton bloom
- near Naples, north of the Florida Keys.  SeaWiFS and MODIS data were
- utilized extensively to monitor this
- bloom and to diagnose the causes
- of its occurrence.

- True-color SeaWiFS image of the Gulf Coast and Mississippi River delta, where excess nutrient runoff contributes to enhanced phytoplankton productivity
- and a large “dead zone” of bottom
- water anoxia.  Ocean color data can be used to evaluate the effectiveness of
- efforts to reduce agricultural nutrient runoff and to mitigate the effects of this runoff on  the coastal region.  This image was acquired on February 14, 1999.

**Sediment Transport Monitoring**

- True-color SeaWiFS image of the peninsula of Florida, acquired on
- October 30, 1998. Sediment deposition patterns are visible in the vicinity of Cape Canaveral, north of Tampa Bay, and
- along the south Florida coast, as well
- as on Little Bahama and Grand Bahama Bank.  Data from SeaWiFS and MODIS has been used to observe the offshore movement of sediments caused by inland floods and hurricanes, providing a large-
- scale regional assessment capability.
- Both MODIS and SeaWiFS data have
- the potential to allow quantification
- of suspended sediment mass, of use
- to coastal development assessment and
- environmental monitoring.

**Processes Affecting Marine Protected Areas**

- SeaWiFS image of the Pacific Coast of North America, acquired on October 6, 2002.   This image uses the false-color palette to display chlorophyll concentration variability.   (Land is shown in
- true color representation.)  Four National Marine Sanctuaries are contained in the area where chlorophyll concentration is visible:  Cordell Bank, Gulf of the Farallones, Monterey Bay, and  Channel Islands.  (The Olympic Coast National  Marine Sanctuary is covered by clouds to the north.) This image illustrates the remarkable capability of  MODIS and SeaWiFS to observe the variability of ocean surface productivity in the coastal zone, which is of particular significance to the ecosystems in the National Marine Sanctuaries.   In addition, MODIS provides concurrent sea surface temperature data, which allows  high-resolution observation of current  patterns and potential detection of El Niño and climate change-related ecological variability.   The synergy of the two MODIS instruments with SeaWiFS can also provide detection of rapid changes on timescales of less than a day.

- How Ocean Color Data Could Be Used for Protection, Management, and
- Restoration of Global Fisheries

- 	The current troubled state of many  pelagic fisheries in the world’s oceans was highlighted recently by the paper of Myers and Worm (2003), “Rapid worldwide depletion of predatory fish stocks”.   In this paper, the authors reported that populations of many large pelagic fish (such as swordfish, marlin, bluefin tuna, sailfish, sharks) have declined to only 10% of their populations in 1950.   This information, combined with predictions that several marine species (epitomized by leatherback turtles) could face extinction within decades due to mortality as “bycatch”, underscores the need for new, advanced fisheries management techniques.
- 	 We propose that ocean color data from current and future missions (such as the operational ocean color data that will be available from the National Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellite System, NPOESS) can be used to provide active fisheries management information.   The concept is quite simple: one of the main commercial uses of ocean color data is for “fish-finding”,  i.e. using the data to indicate areas of high expected fishing success.   As this application has demonstrated feasibility, it is a reasonable supposition that the data could be used in “reverse”, to actively designate fishing
- exclusion zones as they vary with ocean currents and seasons.
- 	There are a few studies that indicate the feasibility of data utilization in
- this manner. Laurs *et al.* 1984 determined that albacore tuna preferred low-
- chlorophyll,  15-18 °C water near higher productivity waters, such as
- convergence zones and major current boundaries.   Polovina *et al.* 2000 utilized radio-tagged loggerhead turtles in conjunction with SeaWiFS data and found that the turtles migrated and foraged along the “Transitional Zone Chlorophyll Front” north of Hawaii, delineated by chlorophyll concentrations of approximately 0.2 mg/m3.  Ocean color data has also been used to examine the dynamics of the Benguela Upwelling Zone adjacent to South Africa and Namibia  and the possible relationship between phytoplankton productivity
- and the pelagic pilchard and anchovy populations.   (Fisheries are the third-
- largest economic sector in Namibia).
- 	Ocean color data clearly shows regions where fish may congregate and
- which influence the movement of larval fish populations, e.g. the Charleston Bump located southeast of Charleston, S.C.   Cetacean sightings have also been correlated with ocean color data, notably in the Bering Sea (summer 1997) during the  occurrence of anomalous warm conditions and an unusually large coccolithophore  bloom, and for pods of spinner dolphins in the Galapagos Archipelago.

- Data extract showing positions of a radio-tracked loggerhead turtle along the “Transitional Zone Chlorophyll Front” (TZCF) north of Hawaii.  SeaWiFS data and turtle locations provided by J. Polovina,
- NMFS.   The TZCF is also the fishing ground for juvenile albacore tuna.  This turtle was also tracked during March and July 2000.

- MODIS-Terra weekly chlorophyll concentration and sea surface temperature data for the week of May 1-8, 2002.    Continuing analysis of data provided by ocean color sensors would allow the establishment of moving “marine reserves” for pelagic fish stocks that would foster replenishment of depleted and endangered populations.

**OPERATIONAL PLAN OUTLINE**
- 	The use of ocean color data for research into the dynamics of marine ecosystems is now well-established.   The operational use of ocean color data for marine resources management, particularly with regard to fisheries conservation and endangered species protection, is still untested.   As ocean color data moves from a primarily research-oriented phase to the operational phase which will utilize the Visible/Infrared Imager/Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on NPOESS, it is now feasible to examine the utilization of ocean color data for these purposes.
- 	Both the SeaWiFS Project and the MODIS/Terra and MODIS/Aqua projects produce global Level 3 data products for eight-day and monthly intervals.   The averaging  (spatial and temporal binning) process that creates these products provides clear delineation of biophysical oceanic features with the elimination of pervasive cloud  cover.  These  products can first be used in a developmental training fashion to establish  correlations between ocean color data and the population distributions of commercial fish stocks and endangered species.  Once the water mass characteristics that are preferred by species are reliably determined, ocean color data would be used to actively define **“no-take”** regions and regions in which only vessels equipped with appropriate gear (such as Turtle Elimination Devices, ‘TEDs’) would be allowed to operate.
- 	The boundaries of these regions would be determined using the most recent data and then characterized with Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates.   The coordinates would be published on the World Wide Web and be made available through the National  Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) and the National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service (NESDIS).  Commercial fish operations would be required to use these coordinates to determine where fishing operations are either permitted or prohibited.  Enforcement of these zones would fall to a variety of federal agencies, including NOAA  and the Coast Guard. The data, images, and protected region boundaries would also be made available to other countries and international agencies, to allow global protection, management, and restoration of fisheries and endangered marine species.

- REFERENCES
- 	Laurs, R. M., P.C. Fiedler and D. R. Montgomery. 1984. Albacore tuna catch distributions
- relative to  environmental  features observed from satellites. *Deep-Sea Research*  **31 (9),** 1085-1099.
- 	Myers, R.A., and B. Worm, 2003.  Rapid worldwide depletion of predatory fish communities.
*Nature* **423,** 280-283.
- 	Polovina J.J., D.R. Kobayashi, D.M. Parker, M.P. Seki, and G.H. Balazs, 2000.   Turtles on the
- edge:  movement of  loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) along oceanic fronts, spanning longline fishing
- grounds in the central North Pacific, 1997-1998.   *Fisheries Oceanography* **9: (1), ** 71-82.

**MODIS-Terra:****  **Launched December 1998:  sun-synchronous, descending node, 705 km altitude orbit with 10:30 AM equatorial crossing time.

**MODIS-Aqua:****   **Launched May 2002:   sun-synchronous, ascending node, 705km altitude orbit with 1:30 PM equatorial crossing time.** **

-      Three NASA remote-sensing missions, the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) Project and the two Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer  (MODIS) instruments on the Terra and Aqua satellites, provide near-continuous daily observations of phytoplankton productivity and  biological/physical interactions in the dynamic coastal zone.   Under
- optimum conditions, three observations can be obtained in one day, at 10:30 AM, noon, and 1:30 PM local time.  The Goddard Earth Sciences DAAC (GES DAAC) provides access to ocean color data products from  each of these missions, and also to sea surface temperature data from the MODIS instruments.   These data can be utilized for several aquatic
- resource management  applications, including:  fisheries;  endangered species protection;   detection of hazardous blooms and eutrophication;  sediment transport;   and improved understanding of processes affecting marine protected areas.  DAAC services and tools allow users to identify and acquire data products  that will be of  immediate use to their specific
- coastal management issues.

- Abstract

-      Starting in 1996 with the launch of the Ocean Color and Temperature Sensor (OCTS) on Japan’s MIDORI satellite, the world of ocean color remote sensing has expanded at an  astonishing pace.   There are now several ocean color instruments in orbit at the present time.   The United States is represented by three primary instruments:   the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Terra and Aqua satellites, and the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) on the Orbview-2 satellite owned and operated by Orbimage Inc. NASA’s SeaWiFS Project receives SeaWiFS data for research uses via a data-buy contract.
-      Data from these instruments can (and should be) applied to numerous coastal zone management applications.   This presentation will briefly explain where and how ocean color data from these instruments can be applied to several different coastal zone management concerns.   These examples will lead to a demonstration of the potential for the use of ocean color data to aid in the stabilization and recovery of pelagic fish resources for the nation and the world.

- Introduction

**SeaWiFS:****    **Launched August 1997:   Sun-synchronous,  descending node, 705 km altitude orbit with local noon  equatorial crossing time;   provides 1 km resolution  Local Area Coverage (LAC), 4 km resolution Global Area Coverage (GAC) and 9 km resolution Level 3 global data products.    Data available for research and education at the GES DAAC two weeks following acquisition;  license required for real-time applications. SeaWiFS has eight bands in the visible range for ocean and land remote sensing.

- Mission Profiles

**MODIS-Terra** and **MODIS-Aqua** both provide 1km resolution LAC and lower spatial resolution GAC and global data products;  processed data is nominally available 2-3 days following acquisition.  Direct broadcast stations provide real-time data product capability.   MODIS has 36 IR, visible, and UV bands;   bands devoted to ocean remote sensing  are 1km resolution, but 500m and 250m resolution bands for land remote sensing are also available.** **

- Coastal Zone Applications of Ocean Color Data

- Fisheries Management and
- Endangered Species

- Orbview-2 Spacecraft

- SeaWiFS Instrument