NOAA PORTS Program

The Physical Oceanographic Real-Time System (PORTS) is a program of NOAA's National Ocean Service that supports safe and cost-efficient navigation by providing ship masters and pilots with accurate real-time information required to avoid groundings and collisions. This technological innovation has the potential to save the maritime insurance industry from multi-million dollar claims resulting from shipping accidents. PORTS includes centralized data acquisition and dissemination systems that provide real-time water levels, currents, and other oceanographic and meteorological data from bays and harbors to the maritime user community in a variety of user friendly formats, including telephone voice response and Internet. Also, PORTS provides nowcasts and predictions of these parameters with the use of numerical circulation models. Telephone voice access to accurate real-time water level information allows U.S. port authorities and maritime shippers to make sound decisions regarding loading of tonnage (based on available bottom clearance), maximizing loads, and limiting passage times, without compromising safety. There are currently PORTS installations at the following locations:

Charleston Harbor
Cherry Point
Chesapeake Bay North
Chesapeake Bay South
Delaware Bay
Houston/Galveston
Humboldt Bay
Lake Charles
Los Angeles/Long Beach
Lower Columbia River
Lower Mississippi River
Mobile Bay
Narragansett Bay
New Haven
New London
New York/New Jersey Harbor
Pascagoula
Port of Anchorage
Sabine Neches
San Francisco Bay
Soo Locks
Tacoma
Tampa Bay

For further information on PORTS, visit the PORTS webpage or contact:

Darren Wright
PORTS© Program Manager
Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services (CO-OPS)
1305 East West Highway
Silver Spring, MD 20910
(301) 713-4278 ext. 193
FAX: (301) 713-4392
Darren.Wright@noaa.gov