Since the last issue there were two major events that excited Bathymetric Mappers. The first was the Hawaiian Tsunami Warning and a course the hurricane Sandy. Cartography is still an art and science. Back in the day, "art" was used to compensate for the lack of data. Modern maps use "art" to make complex concepts easy to understand.
"Good maps" answer most "on topic" questions with a single glance. Computers, GIS databases and mapping software have greatly increase the number of "good maps" and could be considered art...
Earthquakes, Landslides and Volcanoes
All three can cause a tsunami!
My good friend Cash lives in Hawaii Kai and maps are essential in understanding the timing and danger areas during tsunami threats.
This animation shows how RIFT predicts the behavior of a tsunami over a period of 48 hours following the 11 March 2011 Tōhoku, Japan earthquake. Check out the upwelling off the South American coast one minute into the simulation
Simulation of the Indian Ocean Boxing Day 2004 tsunami The non-circular wave-fronts are clearly visible, which indicates curved rays (second 12)
Tides Malaka Straights (built by GOODSTUFF)
SOME kO0l ANIMATION STUFF
HURRICANE TRACKER using Google Maps
Good Weather map for America
Normal Wind pattern for September. There is no influence from any one storm (wind maps)
This map shows Hurricane Sandy as a Category 1 with top wind speeds of 90 mph. The eye of the storm is off the coast of Virginia and Maryland.
For comparison to the image above, here are two other GIFs of other days. The first shows Hurricane Isaac, the other Tropical Storm Debby. (H/T The Atlantic)
GIS-generated image of the New York-New Jersey Upper Bay, with merged bathymetric and topographic datasets. The vertical scale is exaggerated by a factor of ten.
In an age when we are mapping the surfaces of Venus and Mars, it is difficult to believe that so little is known about our own planet. We know more about the moon than we do about the bottom of the oceans.
The Hudson Canyon is still somewhat an ocean wilderness right in the backyard of the largest metropolitan area on earth, New York
Cartography is still a art and science. Lots of new methods and ideas that is marrying more than a few branches of bathymetries
The lines reflect the path of the boat as it gathers the data. The fact that there are blank spots between each of these lines is a sign of how little we really know about the world's oceans.
Some examples of OUTSTANDING maps
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