NOAA Ship Conducts Arctic Hydrographic Reconnaissance

NOAA has made it a priority to update the nautical charts needed by commercial shippers, tankers, passenger vessels, and fishing fleets transiting the Alaskan coastline in ever-greater numbers. In June 2011, Coast Survey issued the Arctic Nautical Charting Plan, a major effort to update Arctic nautical charts for the shipping lanes, approaches, and ports along the Alaskan coast.

Cmdr. James Crocker, commanding officer of Fairweather and chief scientist of the party said that much of Alaska’s coastal area has never had full bottom surveys to measure water depths. A tanker carrying millions of gallons of oil thus has to rely on measurements gathered in the 19th century.

Kathryn Reis, acting director of NOAA’s Office of Coast Survey explains that the coast length of 921 nautical miles is really 2,191 miles of low tidal shoreline once the bays and inlets are taken into account —hence the fact that NOAA needs to increase its charting efforts.

Before NOAA cartographers can update the charts, however, they need the depth measurements and other data gathered by NOAA’s survey vessels like Fairweather.

Many of today’s Alaskan coastal nautical charts, created by NOAA’s Office of Coast Survey, use sporadic depth readings reported by private vessels, some decades or even centuries old. Those vessels lacked the ability to report their exact positions to enable them to gather data accurate enough to ensure quality measurements.

The ship is homeported in Ketchikan, Alaska.