Science and Technology Workshop 1, May 5-6, 2015

Unusual ocean weather and climate patterns have been observed throughout 2014 and early 2015 across the North Pacific basin. Areas of the North Pacific have been as much as 5°C warmer than average, earning the nickname ‘the blob’ in the US northeast, and affecting weather and climate patterns. Extreme conditions in physical and biogeochemical parameters are occurring in many locations, and appear to be impacting pelagic ecosystems, including fisheries. Two workshops are designed to understand the timing and scale of these anomalous oceanographic conditions in the North Pacific, with the intent of maximizing our global and coastal ocean observing systems to deliver information to meet societal needs. The first workshop, held on May 5-6, 2015 at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, Ca, generated a series of research and development questions and issues related to these anomalies. The second, follow-up workshop, proposed for late October or November, 2015, will aim to improve our understanding of how these significant oceanographic variations arose, their impact on our water, weather, and economic well-being, and ways in which we can potentially improve predictive capabilities.