The SEAKEYS network has been operational for over 20 years and provides a long time series of observations in the Florida Keys. The program provides a framework for long-term monitoring and research along the 220 mile Florida coral reef tract and in Florida Bay at a geographical scale encompassing the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary (FKNMS).  Compounding the problem of limited funding, the instruments are primarily on a series of stationary platforms (lighthouses, towers), the structural integrity of which has now becoming questionable due to age. The US Coast Guard do not have plans to repair the lighthouses but intend to sell. It is anticipated that non-profit entities will purchase these for their historical value.

To address the future of SEAKEYS and its infrastructure and funding, the Florida Institute of Oceanography (FIO) held a meeting at the Keys Marine Lab in November 2011. The user community was invited and included representatives from many areas of NOAA (Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary; National Weather Service; Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory; Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory), the National Park Service, the Ocean Reef and Gun Club, and FIO. The NOAA/National Data Buoy Center, Coast Guard, FL Fish and Wildlife Research Institute, and representatives from Audubon, the dive and fishing communities, and staff from a local legislative office were unable to attend, but some sent letters of support. Following the meeting other funding sources were sought but were not successfully identified.

At the end of 2011, due to a lack of financial support, FIO made the difficult decision to terminate the SEAKEYS program, and are withdrawing all FIO assets from the water. NOAA/AOML, with assistance from NOAA/FKNMS, has agreed to take over maintenance of one station (FIO is loaning an instrument to NOAA/AOML for this purpose); NOAA/GLERL are investigating the possibility of maintaining a second station; and a limited subset of meteorological sensors will be visited every two years by NOAA/NDBC, with no maintenance support between visits.

SECOORA Board Member Pat Welsh in the News

Pat Welsh and his team from the University of North Florida were recently highlighted in the local paper for their work in water quality monitoring, with custom designed buoys, Guana Lake in FL.  View the article.

ROFFS Announces New Scientific Paper

Mitch Roffer, SECOORA Executive Committee Member, recently announced that a research paper relating to the impacts of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on Atlantic bluefin tuna spawning in the northern Gulf of Mexico has been peer reviewed and is press in the scientific journal Marine Pollution Bulletin (Elsevier Ltd.).  Nine researchers from industry, academia and government  working together produced the paper "Overlap between Atlantic bluefin tuna spawning grounds and observed Deepwater Horizon surface oil in the Northern Gulf of Mexico."  This paper and its details can be found online.  Funding for this research came from a variety of sources including NASA, NOAA, Florida Institute of Oceanography, University of Miami Cooperative Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Studies, and ROFFS.

October 14-19, 2012 OCEANS 2012 MTS/IEEE, Hampton Roads, Virginia