June 26, 2009
by Christine Yeres
On July 10, Greeley science teacher Bob Oddo will fly to Barbados and leave port bound for the Cape Verde Islands, off the coast of Africa, west of Senegal. He’ll be doing research for NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospherics Administration, in its “Teacher at Sea” program for 2009.
His ship will track dust that flies – in actual dust storms – from the Sahara Desert across the Atlantic Ocean. “Each year, about 1,700 million tones of dust are produced by deserts around the world and about one third of this falls into the oceans,” explained Rebecca Morelle in her article, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7228081.stm ” title=”“The race to chase Sahara’s sand,” “>“The race to chase Sahara’s sand,” on the BBC NEWS, Science/Nature website.
The goal of Oddo’s project is to learn whether, or how, the dust is impacting the continental United States, and how it fertilizes organisms living in the ocean along the way. In effect, the organisms fed by the Saharan sand are able to take up more carbon dioxide as they grow, removing it from the atmosphere, something we could use on the side of fighting climate change, Oddo explained.
“We’ll see what impact the sands have on the climate of the planet,” Oddo stated, “and study the current of the tropical convergence zone that contains currents similar to those that create El Ninos in the Pacific.”
Departure is two weeks away. Does Oddo have his sea legs? “Not at all,” he admitted, “I’ve never even slept on a boat overnight. The closest I’ve come is my kayak in the Hudson. I’m very, very excited.”
If this excites you too, you can go with him, sort of.
He’s bringing just one knap sack, and some bungee cords because the boat will have internet and he’ll have to strap down his laptop when he uses it. “Every day I’ll post a report and you can follow my trip on the internet,” he explained, basically witnessing it and, on some level, participating.” Oddo’s email is .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). You can access his blog through the Greeley website after July 10, or through Teachers at Sea.
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