Images

USGS scientists Nora Nieminski, Jenna Hill, and Brandon Nasr working to cap and secure a trigger core on deck. Trigger cores can provide important information about seafloor sediments just below the seafloor

The crew of research vessel Bold Horizon with USGS science crew prepare to launch the Chirp sub-bottom profiler off the west coast near northern California and southern Oregon.

After recovery, the jumbo piston corer sits on the deck of research vessel Bold Horizon in its launch and recovery system. This muddy collar is removed to reveal the removable length of the core, which sits within a stiff plastic tube inside the metal tube.

USGS marine technician Jenny McKee prepares the jumbo piston corer for launching off research vessel Bold Horizon off the coast of California and Oregon. The corer will collect sediment samples from the seafloor. Scientists will examine the sediment to determine its age, character, and distribution. This area off the west coast of the U.S.

USGS scientist Janet Watt making a shear vane measurement on a gravity core to understand how the seafloor responds to earthquake shaking.

Dr. Nora Nieminski is a research geologist and Mendenhall Fellow at the USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center in Santa Cruz, California. She is pictured here, on board Marine Vessel Bold Horizon, with a piston core sample collected from the southern Cascadia subduction zone offshore of northern California/southern Oregon.

USGS scientists Pete Dal Ferro and Jenny McKee securing a recently collected jumbo piston core (JPC) on the back deck of M/V Bold Horizon for preliminary core processing.

Goleta Beach in Santa Barbara experienced an unusual storm and large wave event in the Spring of 2014. Gaviota Pier, seen far off in the background, sustained heavy damage as did the restaurants on the pier and nearby. The USGS conducts seasonal surveys throught the year to see how the beaches are changing through time.

A female Kemp's ridley sea turtle, named Finley, shows off the popoff ADL (orange) and satellite tag (blue).

The USGS California Deepwater Investigations and Groundtruthing, or Cal DIG, science crew aboard research vessel Bold Horizon on San Francisco Bay.

Scientists collected marine vibracores from a research vessel in Mississippi Sound to study shelf geology as part of a collaboration between Mississippi State University and the USGS St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center.

These “pom-pom” anemones (Liponema sp.) have attached to the rock in a place where there are probably very good currents, which bring small floating particles of food to them. Water depth is 1041 m (3415 ft).

A small juvenile skate (left) and a large rockfish (right) hang out on the murky, silty seafloor with sea stars. Water depth: 856 m (2808 ft).

Photo of Fire Island, New York showing back barrier, dunes, beach, and nearshore environments.

Explore coastal change at Fire Island in this interactive Story Map.

Jumbo piston corer

Fire Island is a barrier island off the coast of Long Island, New York that hosts several protected areas, nesting habitat for shorebirds, and beachgoers looking for a relaxing place for recreation. USGS studies how the island changes over time - in both the past and present - to better understand how the island may evolve in the future. 

Predicted probabilities of dune erosion (inner band), overwash (middle band), and inundation (outer band) for Hurricane Dorian. Photographs are representative of coastal change observed during past storm events.

A great white heron standing atop the mangrove roots of Boggy Key, in the upper Florida Keys. This heron has a limited range, which includes the Florida Keys and Everglades National Park. It is rarely seen outside of these areas. 

Retrieving the MBARI (Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute) MiniROV from the Pacific Ocean offshore of California, on research vessel (R/V) Bold Horizon.

Overview of the high-resolution model grids from: “Dynamically downscaled future wave projections from SWAN model results for the main Hawaiian Islands”

Environmental geoscience fieldwork