Images

Otter Rock, Oregon. The Oregon coast is one of the areas that could be affected by a large earthquake on the Cascadia subduction zone.

Resurrection Bay on August 8, 2016. The water appeared calm in the shelter of the inner bay, but closer to the entrance, swells coming in from the Gulf of Alaska were breaking on a small beach where the three boaters had capsized.

A diver examines the coral reef along Molokini Crater off of the island of Maui, Hawaii.

Phosphorite rock formed on the seafloor in Southern California.

The map on sheet 7 shows “potential” marine benthic habitats in the Monterey Canyon and Vicinity map area, representing a substrate type, geomorphology, seafloor process, or any other attribute that may provide a habitat for a specific species or assemblage of organisms.

Tripod deployed on the reef flat off Jurabi, Ningaloo World Heritage Site, Western Australia, with instrumentation designed to measure tides, waves, currents, and sediment being transported across the reef.

Cerulean damselfish dart around lettuce coral off the Cape Range National Park along the Ningaloo Coast in Western Australia. USGS researchers combined forces with Australian colleagues in this UNESCO World Heritage Site to conduct the most extensive study of how erosion of reefs contribute sand to the beaches—a coast’s natural armor.

Tripod holding instruments and cameras used to measure and study aspects of sediment movement in and around the reef.

In May 2016, Susan Russell-Robinson (Associate Coordinator of the USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program, third from right) and Dave Applegate (USGS Associate Director for Natural Hazards, left) celebrated with the team whose website “USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program (CMGP, now called CMHRP

A colony of the soft coral known as the "bent sea rod" stands bleached on a reef off of Islamorada, Florida. Hard and soft corals are presently bleaching- losing their symbiotic algae – all over the coral reefs of the Florida Keys due to unusually warm ocean temperatures this summer.

Physical scientist Jackson Currie steers a personal water craft (PWC) equipped with GPS and echo sounder through the waves of the nearshore area of Zmudowski State Beach in Moss Landing, California.

A ship will tow this green cable, which contains underwater microphones that record sound reflected off layers beneath the seafloor. USGS scientists will use the data to pinpoint the location of faults.

USGS geologist Jamie Conrad uses a map of the seafloor off Southern California to plan high-resolution mapping southwest of Santa Catalina Island. Small inset shows seafloor data collected by the ship that reveals hills, gullies, and basins.

Satellite image of Cape Lookout National Seashore, NC, taken by Landsat 8 on February 18, 2016.

Large waves breaking on cliffs in western Santa Cruz, California, February 13, 2016.

The USGS Coastal and Estuarine Dynamics Group will be deploying a Nanopod at Pea Island DUNEX experiment site to collect oceanographic information.

USGS scientists survey a beach near San Francisco to assist with a comparison of data derived from aerial photos and lidar.

The coastal bluff along East Cliff Drive in Santa Cruz, California are especially vulnerable to rising sea level during big storms. Sometimes even the rip-rap, put in place to protect roadways and homes, cannot protect the bluffs from erosion.

Waves flood across a coastal road near Santa Cruz, California.

View of the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk amusement park in Santa Cruz, California. Photo was taken from the bluff on East Cliff Drive, east of the San Lorenzo River mouth. Sand on the beach gets eroded, redistributed, and deposited due to the dynamic conditions brought about by storms and changing river flow.

On remote Barter Island, Alaska, Bruce Richmond (right) and Cordell Johnson drill into 500-foot-thick permafrost using a handheld drill with a 2-inch drill bit—a challenging task! It can take 3 hours to drill nearly 20 feet down.