Images

This is the Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center's Sediment Prep Lab, where sediment samples and core subsamples are prepared for analyses.

After adding a little sodium hexametaphosphate dispersant, we use a plunger to carefully stir the cylinder then let it settle, to ensure good mixing and standardized suspension of the sediment.

We can use the tried-and-true method of washing samples through finer and finer sieves, then weighing the sediment trapped in each sieve, to determine sediment size fractions.

After releasing sediment into the top of a settling tube filled with water, a pan and microbalance collects and weighs the sediment as it slowly reaches the bottom of the tube. A computer records the cumulative sediment weight over time, as well as how long it took each particle to reach the pan.

Our fume hood lab allows for sample preparation in safe conditions.

Andrew Stevens runs a personal watercraft rigged with sonar and precision GPS to survey northern Monterey Bay, California.

Alex Snyder (left) and SeanPaul La Selle stay in radio contact with a personal watercraft operator offshore in order to provide supplies and safety near Moss Landing, California. 

Gerry Hatcher (left) and Shawn Harrison adjust a computer controlling video cameras on the roof of the Dream Inn, a 10-story hotel overlooking Monterey Bay in Santa Cruz, California. Harrison uses the images to improve understanding and computer modeling of beach processes. 

The refrigerated sample repository of the USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center in Santa Cruz, CA includes easily accessible shelving space which can store thousands of samples.

Dan Hoover takes a break near Moss Landing, California. Dan drives the all-terrain vehicle seen behind him to rapidly survey long sections of beach using precision GPS. 

Shawn Harrison surveys beach topography using a backpack equipped with precision GPS at Zmudowski State Beach, California. The fog-shrouded Moss Landing Power Plant looms in the background. 

Dann Blackwood, Jon Borden, and Steve Suttles of USGS ready to install moorings in Wellfleet, Massachusetts. USGS scientists measure water velocity, water quality, suspended sediment, and many other values to improve computer models of wetland changes in coastal National Park Service units, including Cape Cod National Seashore.

Jackson Currie maps ocean depths using a personal watercraft equipped with precision GPS and sonar near Capitola, California

Shawn Harrison surveys beach topography using a precision GPS backpack on Twin Lakes State Beach, California. USGS researchers have measured coastal sediment supply and transport patterns in northern Monterey Bay for five years. Twice each year they survey the coast from Santa Cruz to Moss Landing with a variety of devices.

High-resolution (10-meter per pixel) digital elevation model (DEM) of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, using both bathymetry and topography data relative to current modern datum of North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD88). This DEM is the result of collaborative efforts of the U.S.

University of Washington's research vessel R/V Barnes is loaded with the USGS multichannel seismic system components GeoEel, Chirp, and boom plates.

Exposed bedrock on the beach during very low (negative) tide at Isla Vista, California.

Dann Blackwood and Jon Borden inspect a current meter retrieved from the ocean using the research boat Muddy Waters near Wellfleet, Massachusetts.

The house with the USGS BeachCam is in the center of this image, taken Feb. 14, 2017 after a much smaller Noreaster. Visible in the foreground on the left are the remnants of the artificial dune (completely removed by the March 2018 storm), and on the right is the engineered protection put in place by private property owners. 

Beach loss and armoring at Goleta Beach, very low (negative) tide

Installing large boulders as rip rap to armor the shore against further erosion at Goleta Beach in Southern California. The tide is very low (negative).