Great Lakes water data more accessible thanks to new online platform
Boaters, beachgoers, anglers, and water-sport enthusiasts across the Great Lakes now have a new platform for accessing real-time information about the waters we love.
The Great Lakes Observing System has launched a new cloud-based platform to better display information useful to individuals and organizations that work and play on the Great Lakes.
The new online program, called Seagull, pulls data from a variety of sources and displays it through a user-friendly mapping interface.
“Whether deciding to venture out on a boat or confronting the effects of climate change, we want to equip observers with high-quality, up-to-date lake information from the region’s observing network,” said GLOS CEO, Kelli Paige.
Based in Ann Arbor, GLOS is a bi-national non-profit which provides data services that support science, policy, management, and industry in the U.S. and Canada. Based in Ann Arbor, GLOS is one of 11 regional offices that make up the NOAA-funded Integrated Ocean Observing System.
“Over the years we’ve seen changes in the ways people want to access data on their smartphones and the type of information they are looking for is more complex,” Paige said. “We knew we needed to be responsive to these changing trends and make it easier for people to access the information they are looking for.”
Seagull relies on a network of buoys across the Great Lakes to provide real-time weather and water conditions. Users can also toggle between forecast layers which display water temperature, wave heights and wind.
Two West Michigan based software agencies helped bring the Seagull platform to life: Holland-based SpinDance and Digital Industry Group, or DIG for short, in Grand Rapids.
Brian Tol, vice president of engineering at SpinDance, said developing Seagull was a huge technical challenge with lots of moving parts.
“Being in Holland, our team loves the big lakes,” Tol said. “Working on a challenging technical problem that has such an important impact on our backyard? It doesn't get any better than that.”
Tol said finding and accessing Great Lakes data had typically been difficult. “Seagull makes it much easier to access and understand that data,” he said. “It's also going to help local governments make more informed decisions about shipping on the lakes.”
While accessible to everyday users, built-in features reveal much deeper information of interest to the Great Lakes research community.
GLOS plans to add more features to the program in the future. The program was officially launched on Thursday, April 28, 2022 at GLOS's annual meeting in Chicago.
- Try Seagull for yourself: Seagull.GLOS.org
Follow Meteorologist Will Haenni on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram.