Mobile manatee study launched

MOBILE, Ala. - Up to two dozen manatees make their summer homes in Mobile Bay and the Mobile-Tensaw Delta, and researchers want fishermen, boaters and beachgoers to help find them this week. Over the next few days, Dauphin Island Sea Lab scientists will be joined by about six Florida experts as they scour the area in an airplane, three boats and on foot to look for manatees. The effort is part of the Mobile Manatee Sighting Network's ongoing study of Alabama's seasonal manatee population, which scientists say has increased. (Source: Mobile Press-Register, 08/18/09)

New GCRL lab to open in March

OCEAN SPRINGS, Miss. – A new 5,260 square-foot red snapper lab at the Cedar Point site of the Gulf Coast Research Laboratory will be finished by March 2010, allowing lab workers to abandon a temporary wooden structure. The red snapper facility, which received a $1.3 million National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration grant, is one of several coming to the University of Southern Mississippi's Ocean Springs facility. (Source: Mississippi Press, 08/17/09)

Raytheon to review hydrographic course

Raytheon has been awarded a task order to develop and support recertification of curricula through the Naval Education and Training Professional Development and Technology Center in Pensacola, Fla. It was issued under an existing Navy contract. The performance period is to March 31, 2010. Raytheon will review and revise existing course curricula for the education of junior officers and foreign navies in the essentials of hydrographic science. (Source: Raytheon via PRNewswire, 08/05/09)