The NOAA Diving Center assisted the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary (OCNMS)

The NOAA Diving Center assisted the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary (OCNMS) with the recovery of two oceanographic moorings with equipment valued at over $10,000 and containing six weeks of data. Early fall storms had buried mooring anchors in sediment, making them irretrievable from the surface. Since 2000, between April and October, the OCNMS has deployed 12 or more moorings to collect oceanographic data to document water circulation and upwelling, low oxygen, and algal bloom events. Because funding does not support a more robust mooring design, the sanctuary retrieves moorings before they are lost to the Pacific Ocean’s winter storms. Since 2009, the sanctuary has been unable to support a dive team, which in the past has salvaged irretrievable moorings and installations that lost their surface floats. The assistance of the NOAA Diving Center prevented abandonment of the moorings and the loss of valuable data and equipment. The dive team was comprised of CDR Joel Dulaigh, LT Ryan Wattam, Zachary Hileman, and Jim Bostick. The dive operation was conducted off of the sanctuary’s R/V Tatoosh.