ESP Deployment

Deploying the environmental processor aboard R/V Thomas G. Thompson. (Credit: Stephanie Moore)

This week, as part of an IOOS Ocean Technology Transfer award, the NEMO mooring near Cha’ba at La Push, WA, was outfitted and deployed with an environmental sample processor (ESP) to detect harmful algal blooms. The ESP will provide autonomous, near-real-time measurements of the amount of toxin and the concentrations of six potentially harmful algal species.

The new tool’s deployment is part of a collaborative project led by the UW and NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center and funded by the NOAA-led U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System. Partners include NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science, NANOOS, the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Florida-based Spyglass Technologies, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and Bellingham’s Northwest Indian College (NWIC).

The ESP still near the surface. (Credit: Jan Newton)

Here is a video from Transect Films showing the deployment:

 
View near-real time data on NVS and check out the NOAA press release and UW Today article for more information.