U.S. Department of Commerce / NOAA	/ OAR /  ERL / PMEL \  \ NMFS / AFSC / RACE/	FOCI
	Fisheries-Oceanography Coordinated Investigations

Carrie Hadden, Al Hermann, Art Kendall, Allen Macklin (rapporteur), Jim Overland, Phyllis Stabeno

• A brief annual report (Fiscal Year 1999) from Phase II SEBSCC researchers is due by September 18.  Submit the report to Allen Macklin (allen.macklin@noaa.gov).  Reports should be a page or two in length, in electronic format, with a figure and/or table, and follow the requested format (http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/sebscc/report_format.html).  For format information, contact Allen Macklin.

• AFSC's RACE division will hold a program review on Friday, September 10, 1999, for the Regional NMFS director and the AFSC science director.

• FOCI provided ecosystem information (http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/foci/SAFE99.html) to AFSC/REFM for inclusion in the SAFE document.

• FOCI published a forecast (http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/foci/forecast/99.html) of "average" for recruitment of the 1999 year class of Shelikof Strait walleye pollock.

• Al Hermann will attend a NOPP meeting next week in Berkeley on physical and biological modeling for the west coast of North America.

• ALPHA HELIX - Phyllis Stabeno reported that data collected during last month's Alpha Helix cruise will confirm the project's hypothesis that mixing and upwelling can occur at the Inner Front with resultant prolonged production.  A third summer's coccolithophorid bloom is quite extensive, reaching from between mooring sites 2 and 3 northward toward Nunivak Island.  Bristol Bay does not appear to be affected.  Cloudy skies have obscured satellite color photos of the more northern region.

• MILLER FREEMAN -  Miller Freeman scientists on the Pribilof habitat survey also noted coccolithophores between mooring sites 2 and 3 and took samples.  The chlorophyll absorption meter and fluorometer on the CTD are not functioning.

A draft of the FOCI FY 2000 Cruise Schedule (../../operations/fieldops00.html) was distributed for comment.  FOCI will use four platforms (Miller Freeman, Ron Brown, Oshoro Maru, and Alpha Helix) for 13 cruises next year.

FOCI has several ways by which to upgrade its forecast of Shelikof Strait pollock recruitment.  Two elements, advection and late larval abundance, need to be determined in a more robust, repeatable, and quantitative way.  Climate forcing, although part of FOCI's conceptual model, is still not used directly in the forecast.  Some data products used in computing forecast elements require special skills to compute.  FOCI scientists would like to transfer that knowledge to a "smart" web page so that computations can be made by anyone at any time.  Each forecast is validated by observed recruitment, and observed recruitment for each year class is subject to change each year as the year class continues to recruit to the fishery.  This can lead to a change in the validation.  For example, the 1989 year class was forecast to be weak, and observations supported that until this year when continued catch of that year class changed observed recruitment to average to strong.  FOCI scientists feel that this change is a result of other cohorts recruiting to the fishery and errors in length-age relationships.  It was suggested that FOCI use the observed recruitment after the first four years and ignore later developments.

JOINT SEBSCC AND INNER FRONT PI MEETING

SEBSCC and Inner Front scientists will hold a joint meeting on November 8-10, 1999, in Seattle.  Other scientists may be invited, e.g., Jackie Grebmeyer and Knut Aagaard from the NSF Arctic group, and Michael Flint.  SEBSCC advisors are not required to attend, but are welcome, if interested.  SEBSCC project managers will work with Inner Front representatives to develop an agenda for the meeting.  One idea is to have Inner Front PIs meet on Monday, November 8, leaving Tuesday for a joint "Status of the Bering Sea" forum, Wednesday morning for planning manuscripts for a special science volume, and Wednesday afternoon for SEBSCC business.  The Status forum would be structured around themes of climate, physical oceanography, and biological oceanography with designated speakers from the several projects and disciplines.  For the special volume, PIs would be asked to submit candidate titles, authors, and brief descriptions (describing objectives, data sets, etc.) two weeks before the meeting.  Submission prior to the meeting would not preclude additional submissions later, nor would the authors be bound to produce a manuscript.  Further details would be worked out at the meeting, with January 2000 as a target for finalization of content.  Manuscripts would be due in early summer 2000.

Jim Overland met with Coastal Ocean Program (COP) representatives last month to discuss the potential for a regional ecosystem study to follow SEBSCC.  It is unlikely that COP will invite proposals for ecosystem studies as has been done in the past, e.g., BS FOCI and SEBSCC.  COP's strategy is to fund research that results in operational products such as models and forecasts.  There may be interest in supporting research that revalidates operational products in light of changing circumstances such as a regime shift.

Al Hermann and others are considering 1976 and 1994 to represent pre and post regime shift years for GLOBEC-sponsored circulation model runs for the Gulf of Alaska.  These years offer the best selection of information with which to drive the model.  Some PIs felt that 1976 was quite abnormal with an eastward displaced Aleutian Low and maximal sea ice in the Bering.  Please contact Al Hermann (hermann@pmel.noaa.gov) if you have additional comments or recommendations.

The GLOBEC Gulf of Alaska circulation model by Hermann and others is producing a standing eddy in about the location of the observed Sitka eddy.  In the model, the eddy produces southeastward flow along the shelf break, and that is counter to the northwestward flow assumed to occur there.  Anyone having information about the eddy or currents in this area are asked to contact Al Hermann at the address above.

The GLOBEC Gulf of Alaska circulation model is funded through fall 2000.  Al Hermann will repropose in response to the GLOBEC announcement of opportunity this winter.

The SEBSCC Bering Sea circulation model now includes sea ice as a forcing parameter.

The next FOCI PI meeting will be delayed one week because of the PICES meeting.  It will be held at 10 a.m., Thursday, October 21, 1999,  in the AFSC Director's Conference Room (4/2143).  Please submit to Allen Macklin, no later than the day before the meeting, agenda items and fax-ready copies of figures or handouts that you intend to present at the next meeting.  Alternately, presentation materials may be posted on the WWW or e-mailed to remote participants before the meeting.

Mail corrections and addenda to the FOCI Coordinator.