International Coral Reef Early Warning System Now Operational

Jennifer Dupont
NOAA Research - International Affairs

September 16, 2009 — A new Coral Reef Early Warning System (CREWS) station loaded with instruments has been monitoring the health of a thriving, yet vulnerable, coral reef near Little Cayman Island in the Caribbean since July. The reef is healthy, but in the past has been damaged by hurricanes and coral bleaching events.

The station’s instruments include an above-water meteorological device that measures wind speed, gusts, wind direction, air temperature, barometric pressure, precipitation and light. Underwater instruments include a light sensor and a device that measures the conductivity, temperature and depth of seawater. A collaborative effort between NOAA and the Little Cayman Research Center, the monitoring station is currently the only operational station outside the United States.

As part of NOAA’s Integrated Coral Observing Network (ICON), the new CREWS station will report weather and water data to the Cayman Islands Weather Service and NOAA’s National Weather Service. This information will be invaluable for future hurricane forecasts/models and may help predict events such as coral bleaching and fish spawning, which can threaten and enhance the marine ecosystem in this area, respectively.

Little Cayman residents are very enthusiastic about the project because the CREWS station will provide the small island with essential meteorological and sea condition data — a first for a community whose livelihood depends on tourism and recreational activities, such as SCUBA diving and fishing charters.

Scientists and technicians from NOAA’s Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory (AOML) and OAR International Activities, led by AOML’s Jim Hendee, traveled to Little Cayman Island to install the CREWS instrumentation on a 38-foot-tall pylon adjacent to a thriving coral reef situated in 22 feet of water. The successful installation and operation of this station has led to plans to expand ICON to the greater Caribbean and to global stations in the Red Sea and Western Pacific — areas where similar reef monitoring efforts are needed.

To learn more about the ICON Reef and this CREWS station project, check out field blogs and regular updates from the scientists involved. Little Cayman station and satellite-integrated data are also available online.