Images

A look into the USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center’s Marine Minerals Laboratory Suite.

Gerry Hatcher (left) and Shawn Harrison work on their video-camera station atop a hotel in Santa Cruz, California.

Views of Madeira Beach, Florida, produced from a 17-minute video shot on June 20, 2017. Left: Snapshot, or first frame of video. Right: Time-averaged image, sometimes called a “timex,” created by averaging the intensity of light recorded at each spot, or “pixel,” during the 17-minute video.

Diagram of different ocean features that contribute to coastal flooding.

Carmel River channel in the former reservoir above San Clemente Dam in Monterey, California.

Our Coast, Our Future web viewer showing an example of flood projections for the Russian River.

CoSMoS’s approach to projecting flood hazards: global winds, waves, tides, and anomalous water levels are scaled down to the local scale for  projecting nearshore wave heights, flooding, and shoreline change, including beach erosion and cliff failures.

Learn more at usgs.gov/cosmos

Example of CoSMoS projection displayed in the Our Coast, Our Future (OCOF) online tool.

Example of CoSMoS projected flooding extents for a 1.5 meter sea level rise in combination with possible 100 year return period coastal storms.

Underwater photograph showing corals in Tāfeu Cove, National Park of American Samoa, north shore of Tutuila Island, American Samoa.

Close-up views of the toe of the Mud Creek landslide created from air photos taken May 27 (top), June 13 (middle), and June 26 (bottom). Caltrans built roads on top of the slide for assessment and monitoring activities.

Topographic-change image produced by comparing 3D map derived from May 27 air photos with that derived from June 13 air photos. Note that material has eroded from the seaward edge of the toe (yellow and orange tones), and material has built up on beaches to either side of the slide (blue tones).

Shawn Harrison uses his new skills to check out the surf at Santa Cruz, California.

Exposed bedrock on the beach, below the University of California, Santa Barbara

Multichannel seismic-reflection profile across the Queen Charlotte-Fairweather fault, acquired aboard the R/V Norseman in August 2016. Dashed red line in enlarged section at lower right is the Queen Charlotte-Fairweather fault. m, meter; km, kilometer; ms, millisecond.

A look into the USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center’s Marine Minerals Laboratory Suite.

“Variance” images derived from the same videos used in the studies. Left, Madeira Beach; right, Cowells Beach. In a variance image, the more variation in light intensity at a given pixel, the brighter the value assigned to that pixel. Bright areas indicate many changes in light intensity, caused by a lot of movement.

Top of a ferromanganese crust sample collected from 1,896 meters water depth at Necker Ridge in the central north Pacific. The surface of this crust was in contact with ocean water and grew just 2 millimeters per million years.

During a USGS Open House in Santa Cruz, California, research geologist Amy East shows onlookers how to sift sand to determine its size.

Visitors watched closely as Alicia Balster-Gee (in green vest) presented our research on marine geohazards in Alaska.

Members of the PCMSC Marine Minerals Team, including physical science technician Kira Mizell (center), took turns describing the importance of seafloor minerals.