Images

Three-dimensional view of the Hosgri fault 45 meters below the seafloor, revealing fault strands (black), and potential paths along the fault that fluid could follow (green/blue). The other colors represent different geologic layers.

The USGS strives to put coastal change data and information at the fingertips of users such as planners and emergency managers. The explicit goal is to enable users to integrate and apply USGS data and tools to address their specific needs. Online resources such as the Coastal Change Hazards (CCH) portal are designed with applied use of data in mind.

Photographs taken during Tropical Storm Colin (left, June 6, 2016) and one day later (right) on Sunset Beach in the town of St. Pete Beach, Florida. Storm waves eroded the beach and dune, producing a cliff-like feature called a beach scarp. Continuous video collected during a storm could provide more information about the processes causing this coastal change.

USGS ocean engineer Gerry Hatcher with the camera system he helped create for recording the precise time and geographic location of each air photo it takes. The system is mounted in the cargo compartment of a Cessna 182R airplane and takes photos through a window cut into a removable cargo door (right).

USGS research oceanographers Jenna Brown and Joe Long installed this video camera atop the Shoreline Island Resort hotel in Madeira Beach, Florida. Starting in February 2017, the camera has recorded video for 17 minutes every hour during daylight hours.

A high resolution digital video camera is installed atop a waterfront hotel at Madeira Beach, Florida, overlooking the Gulf of America coast.

Lush thicket of staghorn coral in the Dry Tortugas National Park

Kathryn Smith of the USGS St.

Sunset at Sage Lot Pond Salt Marsh Observatory marks the end of 16 hour field effort. During this sampling, USGS researchers captured the exchange of materials between the marsh and estuary. This field site provides infrastructure to keep sensors deployed nearly year-round so changes across seasons and extreme events, such as large storms, are captured.

USGS scientists Lauren Toth and Jen Flannery of the St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center discuss how they study corals to better understand past climate change. The Center participates in the St. Petersburg Science Festival each year. 

High tides are one challenge of working in tidal wetlands! Here the marsh platform is completely submerged during a spring tide. The boardwalk, which scientists use to access the site, is also under water during this extreme high tide, while the solar panels powering some instruments remain dry.

Wally Brooks records water quality data from a salt marsh creek (Cape Cod, MA)

On October 6, 2016, scientists lower an instrument package on a taut-wire mooring into the canyon. The sediment trap (long funnel-shaped device) is designed to capture mud and sand carried in turbidity flows; the other sensors measure currents and suspended sediment.

Sediment trap is being prepared for deployment into Monterey Canyon offshore of Monterey, California.

Jennifer Flannery at the USGS exhibitor booth at the Society for Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) in Long Beach, California, from October 13–15, 2016

The Society for Advancement of Chicanos/Hispanics and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) held a conference in Long Beach, California, from October 13–15, 2016. Presenters at the conference in the USGS-sponsored session titled, “Clocks in the Rocks, Coral, and Wood: Dating Techniques That Keep Ti

Six USGS scientists presented their research at the 6th International Symposium on Deep-Sea Corals in September, 2016. This all-female force hailed from USGS centers in West Virginia, California, and Florida. Left to right: Jill Bourque, Cheryl Morrison, Nancy Prouty, Katharine Coykendall, Amanda Demopoulos, Christina Kellogg.

USGS is studying climate change impacts to U.S. Pacific and Arctic coasts. Alaska’s north coast is predominantly erosional, retreating on average about 1.4 meters per year.

USGS geologist Amy East was delighted to observe a Chinook salmon carcass upstream from two dams recently removed from the Elwha River in Washington State. River restoration has allowed salmon to reach upstream spawning grounds for the first time in more than a century.

Participants at the September 2016 Argus Workshop at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Field Research Facility in Duck, North Carolina. Labels provide names of four participants from USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program (Long, Plant, Brown, Harrison) and two participants from Oregon State University (Holman, Stanley).

Adult polar bear walking across a recently overwashed barrier island during a large Arctic storm in September 2016. The barrier island is offshore of Barter Island on Alaska’s north coast.