Instrumentation to support modeling and simulation for coastal management

The Naval Oceanographic Office (NAVOCEANO), located in southern Mississippi, has a strong interest in establishing underwater test areas in the northern Gulf of Mexico to support engineering performance evaluation of its emerging Autonomous Undersea Vehicle (AUV) Program and long-term, in-situ instrumentation for real-time and near-real-time monitoring of the littoral marine environment. To this end, NAVOCEANO has partnered with local academic and commercial organizations with interest in developing a comprehensive understanding of the dynamics of the Gulf of Mexico to form the Long-Term Estuary Assessment Group (LEAG). Partners in LEAG include the Center for Bioenvironmental Research of Tulane and Xavier Universities, the University of Southern Mississippi, and the Minerals Management Service at the University of Mississippi. LEAG is additionally in liaison with other established groups which share an interest in the Gulf, including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Waterways Experiment Station at Vicksburg, Mississippi, the Louisiana University Marine Consortium, and the Northern Gulf of Mexico Littoral Initiative. LEAG proposes to establish the following assets that would be made available to all parties with interest in better understanding, thus better managing, the resource's and environmental health of the Gulf of Mexico: (1) a digital data base that reflects historical Gulf of Mexico environmental data, with provision for efficient and economical updating with newly acquired observations, (2) an Environmental Data Fusion and Visualization Center, and (3) a Survey Mission Planning and Simulation Center. Recording instruments would be installed in the lower Mississippi River and in the Gulf of Mexico on fixed platforms such as piers, channel marker buoys, weather buoys maintained jointly by the U.S. Coast Guard and the National Data Buoy Center, and cooperating oil production platforms.