Integrated Ocean Observing System

The Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) is an organization of systems that routinely and continuously provides quality controlled data and information on current and future states of the oceans and Great Lakes from the global scale of ocean basins to local scales of coastal ecosystems. It is a multidisciplinary system designed to provide data in forms and at rates required by decision makers to address seven societal goals.

IOOS is developing as a multi-scale system that incorporates two, interdependent components, a global ocean component, called the Global Ocean Observing System, with an emphasis on ocean-basin scale observations and a coastal component that focuses on local to Large Marine Ecosystem (LME) scales. Large Marine Ecosystems (LMEs) in U.S. coastal waters and IOOS Regional Associations.

Many of IOOS' component regional systems are being dismantled for lack of federal funding, including the Gulf of Maine Ocean Observing System GoMOOS . This has resulted in the loss of long term data sets and information used by Coast Guard search and rescue operations.

Read more about Integrated Ocean Observing System:  Regional Associations

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