About the Expedition

On January 21, 2010, scientists from the Coral Reef Ecosystem Division of the NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center (CRED/PIFSC), along with visiting scientists from the Hawaii Division of Aquatic Resources, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, San Diego State University, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and local agencies in American Samoa, departed on a three month expedition to Johnston Atoll, Howland and Baker Islands, American Samoa, Jarvis Island, Palmyra Atoll, and Kingman Reef aboard the NOAA Ship Hi'ialakai. This is the fifth biennial Pacific Reef Assessment and Monitoring Program (Pacific RAMP) expedition to American Samoa and the seventh to the Pacific Remote Island Areas. The expedition is sponsored by NOAA's Coral Reef Conservation Program (CRCP) and is divided into three segment sequentially led by Chief Scientists Benjamin Richards, Rusty Brainard and Jamison Gove.

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Friday, April 30, 2010

Back to Honolulu

The Hi'ialakai returned safely to port in Honolulu on Sunday, April 24 at 0800 bringing a very successful completion to HA1001, the 2010 Pacific RAMP expedition to Johnston Atoll, the Phoenix Islands, American Samoa, and the Line Islands. All told, we had the participation of 44 scientists from eight different research institutions and local and regional management organizations. We visited 13 islands, reefs, or banks and were once again amazed by the diversity of life found beneath the waves.

In the days since the ship returned to port we have been offloading equipment and getting everything back to its rightful place, ready for our next expedition to the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands in September of 2010. We want to thank everyone who followed along with our expedition and especially those of you who wrote in with your questions and comments. We hope that we have been able to answer most of them and look forward to hearing from you again on future expeditions.

With that, we will sign off for now. As the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands expedition begins, we will host a new blog and will post the address both here and on the CRED FaceBook page where you can follow-along with all of the most up-to-date information on our program.

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