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SERVICES

THE NEW PORT OF NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY


OPERATIONAL FORECAST SYSTEM
BY

EUGENE WEI

he real-time Port of New


York and New Jersey
Operational Forecast
System (NYOFS) became
operational on 10 February
2003 at NOAAs National
Ocean Service (NOS) in
Silver Spring, Maryland.
NYOFS generates hourly
nowcasts and hourly forecast
guidance out to 30 hours of
currents and water levels for
the Port region, including
Raritan Bay, Newark Bay,
and Upper Bay, the Kill Van
Kull, Arthur Kill, the lower
Hudson River, and the East
River.
NYOFS graphical productsincluding time series,
maps, and animations of water levels and currents,
nowcasts, and forecast guidanceare disseminated
through an NOS Web site Fig. 1. NYOFS nowcast/forecast guidance locations.
(http://co-ops.nos.noaa.gov/
NYOFS/nyofs.shtml). The
model predictions are displayed as a graph of the assurance and control of the NYOFS inputs, operawater-level height and current velocity at measure- tional procedures, and product dissemination.
Historically, mariners navigating in New York
ment stations and other locations throughout the bay
(Fig. 1). The system has been incorporated into NOSs Harbor have used NOAAs tide and tidal current
Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System tables for the best estimate of expected water levels
(PORTS), which provides an operational monitor- and currents. However, these tables cannot predict
ing system (24 hours a day, 7 days a week) for quality changes due to wind, atmospheric pressure, and river
flow, which are often significant (Fig. 2). Furthermore, the tide water level and tidal current predicAFFILIATION: WEI NOAA/National Ocean Service, Coast
tions are available at only a few locations. Although
Survey Development Laboratory, Silver Spring, Maryland
new technology, such as PORTS, at selected locations
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR: Eugene Wei, NOAA/National
maintained by NOS provides near-real-time inforOcean Service, Coast Survey Development Laboratory, 1315 East
mation to the users, there is still need for more inWest Highway, N/CS13, Silver Spring, MD 20832
E-mail: eugene.wei@noaa.gov
formation for assuring navigation safety. These inDOI: 10.1175/BAMS-84-9-1184
clude 1) near-real-time water level and current
2003 American Meteorological Society
information at locations without gauges, 2) shortterm (12 days) water level and current forecast guid1184 |

SEPTEMBER 2003

New Jersey. The nowcasts are


available at approximately 15
minutes past the top of the
hour. In the forecast cycle, surface forcing is provided by surface wind forecast guidance
from the NWS/NCEP Eta-12
mesoscale weather forecast
model. For the open boundary conditions, NYOFS is
driven by subtidal water level
forecast guidance from the
NWS Extra-Tropical Storm
Fig. 2. NYOFS water-level nowcast and forecast guidance along with tidal
Surge model along with the
prediction and observation at the Bayonne Bridge, NY.
NOS tidal harmonics. In addition, the NYOFS nowcasts
ance, and 3) detailed information on currents in navi- serve as the initial conditions for each forecast cycle.
gational channels, such as the Kill Van Kull, for U.S. The NYOFS forecast guidance is available at approxiCoast Guard right of way decision making and ship mately 40 minutes past the top of the hour.
maneuvering.
APPLICATIONS. NYOFS products have been used
SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT. NYOFS includes a in several applications for safe navigation in the harbor.
hydrodynamic model component and a suite of soft- OMC-International of Australia has developed a shipware for processing input and output data, including based Dynamic Underkeel Clearance (DUKC) System
graphic applications. The system operation consists for the Port of New York/New Jersey. The DUKC sysof three components: input data ingestion, hydrody- tem utilizes real-time observations and NYOFS waternamic model nowcast/forecast simulations, and level forecasts in the harbor (such as shown in Fig. 3)
model data postprocessing. Each element is controlled
by automated scripts under a Unix environment. The
postprocessing allows a graphical display of model
output on the Internet as well as electronic dissemination to users.
The hydrodynamic is based on the three-dimensional Princeton Ocean Model with a nested-grid
configuration. A high-resolution grid is embedded
within and dynamically connected to a coarse grid to
provide detailed current shears and eddies in the navigation channels of the Kill Van Kull leading into the
Port of Elizabeth and Newark Bay. The spatial resolutions of the coarse and fine grids are approximately
3501000 and 120250 m, respectively. There is oneway coupling from the coarse to the fine grid and the
model is run in a three-dimensional barotropic mode.
The model system has been extensively calibrated
with observations and has gone through a validation
process to pass specific NOS criteria.
NYOFS has an hourly nowcast cycle and 4 times
day -1 forecast cycles (0500, 1100, 1700, and 2300
UTC). In the nowcast cycle, the model is driven by
real-time water levels and surface wind velocities from
NOS observing stations in the Port of New York and Fig. 3. NYOFS water-level forecast guidance.
AMERICAN METEOROLOGICAL SOCIETY

SEPTEMBER 2003

| 1185

erators becomes critical to ensure input data continuity and NYOFS product quality.
The system is designed for automatic operation
with minimum manual attention. Therefore, the system requires an automatic recovery mechanism in
case of system failure, such as model instability due
to erroneous input
data or unexpected
power interruption.
The hourly nowcast
is particularly critical to the system operation. Therefore,
the recovery procedure implemented
in NYOFS assures
the continuation of
system operation
and the product
quality.
NYOFS will be
undergoing modifications by adding
more forecast products based on user
(e.g., Sandy Hook
Fig. 4. Example of NYOFS near-surface current forecast guidance.
Pilots Association)
feedback for navigaThe three-dimensional circulation field has been tion purposes. To date we have received requests for
used by NOAAs Office of Response and Restoration additional forecast guidance products for water level
for improved response to hazardous materials release. at the Goethals Bridge in New Jersey, a cross-chanThat office has utilized NYOFS three-dimensional ve- nel current velocity section in the Kill Van Kull, and
locity fields (shown in Fig. 4) as the advection forc- detailed current patterns near Hells Gate at the intersection of the Harlem and East Rivers.
ing for their oil spill trajectory prediction model.
to determine the minimum safe underkeel clearance
along the complete transit from berth to the harbor
entrance. With NYOFS forecast guidance, this system
allows shippers to make sound decisions regarding
maximizing tonnage and limiting passage times, without compromising safety.

EXPERIENCE. One of NYOFSs objectives is to


provide accurate water-level and current information
to mariners in a timely manner. This is possible with
the near-real-time observations from the NOS
PORTS system as input. The quality control of input
data (e.g., water levels and winds at Sandy Hook, NY)
is essential to the accuracy of model system nowcasts
and forecasts. Occasionally, the water-level primary
acoustic gauge is frozen in the winter; a prompt switch
to the backup water-level pressure gauge by NOS op-

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SEPTEMBER 2003

FOR FURTHER READING


Wei, E., 1998: Development of a New York/New Jersey
Harbor Water Level and current Nowcast/Forecast
System. Proc. Second Conf. on Coastal Atmospheric
and Oceanic Prediction and Processes. [More information available online at http://co-ops.nos.noaa.gov/
NYOFS/nyofs.shtml.]

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