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World’s oceanographers convene to look at ocean forecasting and societal applications
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The inaugural meeting of the Indo‐Pacific Oceanography Reference Group (IPORG) was held in March this year at the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) Regional Programme Office in Perth, Western Australia.
South Africa was represented by student Sarah-Anne Nicholson from the University of Cape Town, who attended on behalf of SAEON and the South African Weather Service.
Other participating organisations were the UNESCO IOC Perth Office, BLUElink Ocean Forecasting Australia, Western Australia Global Ocean Observing System (WAGOOS), IOGOOS (Indian Ocean Global Ocean Observing System), Southeast Asian Global Ocean Observing System (SEAGOOS), Pacific Islands Global Ocean Observing System (PIGOOS), Integrated Marine Observing System (IMOS) and Indian Ocean Tsunami Warning System (IOTWS).
Forum to foster sound working relations
The purpose of this and future IPORG meetings is to provide an informal forum to promote interaction between members in the interest of forging and strengthening working relationships. The meetings allow for updates on member programmes (current and prospective), following up on mutual interests, and investigating potential collaborative opportunities among member organisations.
The meeting commenced with updates from members on current and prospective activities of each of their programmes, followed by discussions on the relevance of IPORG, including the issue of how to link IPORG discussions with the GOOS scientific steering community’s new structure. Another issue that was highlighted is the lack of communication between the sampling, frequency and intensity of the Essential Ocean Variables [EOV] being measured. The decision was taken that IMOS would encourage the coordination and communication between the data collection points.
The full report of the meeting is available here
IOGOOS piloting project
The IPORG inaugural meeting was followed by a two-day IOGOOS workshop on Modelling for Ocean Forecasting and Process Studies (MOFPS).
The workshop was attended by representatives from the UNESCO IOC Perth Office, Australian BLUElink (Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO: scientists and applications experts), and IOGOOS key stakeholders in sub-regional ‘demonstration’ areas (where relevant systems/models will be applied in demonstration mode): North Indian Ocean; South West Indian Ocean; and South East Indian Ocean.
The plans to develop an IGOOS Pilot Project: Modelling for Ocean Forecasting and Processes were discussed during the 7th annual meeting of the Indian Ocean Global Ocean Observing System (IOGOOS-7) in Western Australia in 2010.
The objectives of this project are to build capacity in ocean forecasting among IOGOOS members by taking observations through to models through to societal applications. The specific aims include the development of ocean prediction systems (operational implementation, modelling and data assimilation), generating ocean forecasts, generating boundary conditions for finer scale nested models in regions of interest, facilitating marine management and conservation of biodiversity, and understanding of and adaptation to marine and coastal hazards through ocean forecasting and related ocean modelling.
The workshop commenced with presentations by the demonstration regions, followed by discussions on key stakeholders and related needs in respect to ocean forecasting, observations and the associated data processing/IT.
A full report of the workshop can be viewed here
Acknowledgments:
I would like to extend my appreciation and gratitude to:
- The Commonwealth Government of Australia: Bureau of Meteorology (BoM), UNESCO IOC Perth Regional Programme Office for their generous co-sponsorship support and hosting of this workshop;
- CSIRO - for their support of this workshop; as well as
- SAEON and the South African Weather Service for allowing me the opportunity to participate in the workshop.
