the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
| 20 Oct 2022
The effects of Hurricane Harvey on Texas coastal zone chemistry
Abstract. Hurricane Harvey deposited over 90 billion cubic meters of rainwater over central Texas, USA, during late August/early September 2017. During four cruises (June, August, September and November 2017) we observed changes in hydrography, nutrient and oxygen concentrations in Texas coastal waters. Despite intense terrestrial runoff, nutrient supply to the coastal ocean was transient, with little phytoplankton growth observed and no hypoxia. Observations suggest this was probably related to the retention of nutrients in the coastal bays, rapid uptake by phytoplankton of nutrients washed out of the bays, as well as dilution by the sheer volume of rainwater, and the lack of significant carbon reserves in the sediments, despite the imposition of a strong pycnocline. By the November cruise conditions had apparently returned to normal and no long-term effects were observed.
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Notice on discussion status
The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
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The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
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Journal article(s) based on this preprint
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
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RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2022-1075', Anonymous Referee #1, 24 Oct 2022
Chapman et al. provide results from hydrographic/nutrient/oxygen surveys of Texas coastal waters following Hurricane Harvey in 2017. Episodic events are often thought to have disproportionate environmental impacts, so this sort of study is welcome. The authors were fortunate to have done some coastal surveys before the storm. And, while one might have wished for a more detailed time series after the storm, the limits of obtaining funding, supplies, and shiptime meant that their first post-storm cruise occurred several weeks after the storm. Having been in a similar situation myself, I can appreciate their predicament. Furthermore, their results basically indicate that nothing ‘big’ happened offshore biogeochemically. That is, there didn’t appear to be a big enrichment of nutrients nor any resulting hypoxia (though, if something big and brief happened before they could get out sampling, they would have missed it). Nonetheless, observing a muted response to a major stimulus is an important result. So, this is ultimately publishable and will be of interest to the community.
My main quibble with this manuscript is that it is too lengthy (~9000 words) for what is shown. For instance, there’s a presentation of satellite chlorophyll images with a couple pages of discussion and then field fluorescence data and then finally an acknowledgment that the discrepancy between satellite and inferred in situ chlorophyll likely reflects CDOM interference on the images. Likewise there’s a fair bit of text about why no hypoxia was observed on the shelf following the storm....since this is all fairly speculative, I think it could and should be condensed. That said, one topic that could use a little commentary (i.e., just a few sentences) is comparisons with other post-hurricane coastal studies. Just a brief ‘what’s similar/what’s different’ summation could be of interest.
Some additional comments:
1. At various spots in the text, including tables, numbers are presented with two much implied precision (significant figures). In some cases this may have resulted from a conversion from English units to metric (e.g., the <1.29 µM PO4 in Table 3 which was probably originally <40 µg-P/L).
2. A number of the figures have text in too small a font to be able to read. Even ODV can have its default font settings changed (and, you can even get it to show a µ rather than a u). Also, for the figures that have multiple parts representing different cruises, it would be nice if the dates were shown on each sub-plot rather than making the reader go to the caption.
3. A minor point, but in Table 1, the caption starts with “Precipitation rates (cm)”. I am afraid that cm is an amount, not a rate. I suspect these numbers are cm/mo.
4. On Fig. 4, there are some contour wobbles near the coastline that are not supported by data. Adjusting the ODV contouring parameters or masking out the near shore might be helpful.
5. Table 2: no units are provided.
6. Lines 348-350: Ammonia was variable and in greater abundance than nitrate, but DIN follows nitrate? I am confused.
7. There are lots of little grammar and style errors. For instance, µM/L is used in a few spots (including the text, a table, and a figure)...it should either be µM or µmol/L.
8. Lines 425-432: The authors seem to be saying that nutrients were removed in the bays fairly rapidly by blooms. But also, they indicate that Galveston Bay was flushed with 3-5x its volume of freshwater. And, later in the paper they allude to a flushing or rate-limitation effect in which the initial runoff is high in nutrients and then the source gets depleted. So, couldn’t the fall in bay nutrients have resulted from the rapid flushing of the bay by a diminishing nutrient source?
9. Lines 445-446: This is a little confusing. Previously you’ve said that you didn’t see shelf hypoxia. Now you mention that some other nearby systems “similarly showed rapid short-term nutrient increases followed by hypoxia”. I think this just needs some slight rewording because “similarly” implies that you did see hypoxia in your study area.
10. Figure 7: a location map would be helpful. Also, are these surface or bottom samples?
11. Lines 450-457: “This is not unexpected given the solubility of nitrate ions relative to the other two.” Please provide a reference.
12. Line 544: chlorophyll a
13. Hopefully, the note in the acknowledgments that the data ‘are being submitted’ will be updated to ‘the data are available at’ by the time of any revisions to the manuscript.Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-1075-RC1 -
AC1: 'Reply on RC1 and RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
The comment was uploaded in the form of a supplement: https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2022/egusphere-2022-1075/egusphere-2022-1075-AC1-supplement.pdf
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AC1: 'Reply on RC1 and RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
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RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2022-1075', Anonymous Referee #2, 20 Nov 2022
General Comment:
To understand the effects of Hurricane Harvey on Texas coastal zone chemistry, especially inorganic nutrients and dissolved oxygen. The authors used five cruises measurements, two pre- and three post-hurricane, with data on temperature, salinity, dissolved inorganic nutrients, DO, and fluorescence at stations along Texas coastal zone, Gulf of Mexico. In addition, both wind and current data were retrieved from website of the TABS moorings system along the Texas coast and the National Data Buoy Center. To evidence the phytoplankton dynamics at pre- and post-hurricane periods, satellite imagery was used and downloaded from the NASA Goddard ocean color website. I appreciate and admire the amount of data set of this ms.
I appreciate they provided a lot of data set, especially the field data. The results showed that even with intense terrestrial runoff due to rainfall caused by hurricane, nutrient supply to the coastal ocean was transient and with little phytoplankton growth and no hypoxia in coastal zone after hurricane. To demonstrate and explain those results and outcomes, a lot of data has been applied. However, I do find out that the whole manuscript mostly only stated the observed results but lacked of the significant scientific evidences, especially without supporting by statistical evidences. In addition, the presentation of this ms should be in a more logistic way and provided the organized and sorted information; the unnecessary details normally will distract the way of thinking and reading of the reader. In the text, there are also many local names has been addressed when described the data, and they should be clearly labeled in the map. Otherwise, it will confuse the international reader, especially for whom do not familiar with this region. Overall, I do feel this ms was very descriptive and it should be concise and focus on the main theme of this Hurricane effect with supporting evidences from this study.
Specific comments:
Introduction:
In the introduction, you might want to focus on what we have known about the phenomena, e.g., variables or ecosystems response to hurricane’s impact. Therefore, you may consider to simplify or trim the unnecessary details regarding description on hurricanes and Hurricane Harvey.
lines 31-39. This can be simplified by one sentence.
lines 55-59, again, too much unnecessary details on Hurricane Harvey, and you might only focus on its heavy rainfall here.
lines 73-94, same as previous comments.
Methods:
lines 130-133, all the instrument should provide the company info.
line 155-156, please indicate whether the fluorometer data has been calibrated with in-situ Chl a data or not.
Results:
line 153, You may want to consider to present wind field (not shown in this study) and current movement data together. It will then better show the impact of hurricane and other conditions on both variables.
line 189, 191, Traditionally, reference(s) is not cited in the Results section.
line 218, you may want to present the measured temperature as supplementary information.
line 227, again, reference.
line 299, reference again.
lines 329-330, references again.
Discussion.
This is a very long Discussion section, you may want to consider to separate it into different subtitles, e.g., impact on the Bay regions, inner shelf, offshore, phytoplankton, as well as oxygen dynamics?
lines 551-552, Sabine Lake to Port Aransas Bay, the name should be marked or labeled in the map.
lines 589-590, please consistent with the unit of same variable throughout the ms, e.g., μg/L and mg m-3.
lines 600-603, so, the satellite-derived results might mislead the interpretation of your results?
lines 608-618, I believe the statement regarding hypoxia formation has been well known, and you may want to simplify it here.
Lines 659-719, four factors have been proposed to explain why there was no hypoxia following Hurricane Harvey. The direct evidences of those factors should be provided to support your idea and persuade the reader.
Table 1, rates (cm hr-1)? If so, please revise it. Also, you should present the locations of precipitation in the sampling map. Please also consider move this table to supplementary information.
Fig. 1, You might want to mark and indicate the sampling area in this figure. The reader will have better idea where the stations located.
Fig. 2, Please remove or describe the undescribed label in the figure. e.g., Yellow triangle X. Also, please mark the line(s) which mentioned in the text, e.g., line 3.
Fig. 3, You might want to combined all panel (A, B, C, and D) of each buoy’s data into a longer time period and also marked your pre- and post-hurricane sampling periods and hurricane period in the longer time panel’s data plot. In this way, the reader can clearly picture all the time frame of your study.
You may want to consider to combine Fig. 1-3 into one figure or at least Fig. 1 and 2. It will provide a clear picture for the reader regarding your study site, sampling period, and current condition of your study.
Fig. 4, it will be easier to follow your description if Mississippi-Atchafalaya river system, Galveston Bay, and Matagorda Bay are marked on the map.
Fig. 5, y-axis, the water column depth should mark with minus sign; Please mark pycnocline in DO profiles. Also, please clearly indicate which September cruise for this data set (I know which cruise, but it still should be clearly indicated in the caption).
Fig. S3, it is more make sense to me if you reverse x- and y-axes plot of this figure.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-1075-RC2 -
AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
See comments submitted to RC1 (contains replies to both reviewers)
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-1075-AC2
-
AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
Interactive discussion
Status: closed
-
RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2022-1075', Anonymous Referee #1, 24 Oct 2022
Chapman et al. provide results from hydrographic/nutrient/oxygen surveys of Texas coastal waters following Hurricane Harvey in 2017. Episodic events are often thought to have disproportionate environmental impacts, so this sort of study is welcome. The authors were fortunate to have done some coastal surveys before the storm. And, while one might have wished for a more detailed time series after the storm, the limits of obtaining funding, supplies, and shiptime meant that their first post-storm cruise occurred several weeks after the storm. Having been in a similar situation myself, I can appreciate their predicament. Furthermore, their results basically indicate that nothing ‘big’ happened offshore biogeochemically. That is, there didn’t appear to be a big enrichment of nutrients nor any resulting hypoxia (though, if something big and brief happened before they could get out sampling, they would have missed it). Nonetheless, observing a muted response to a major stimulus is an important result. So, this is ultimately publishable and will be of interest to the community.
My main quibble with this manuscript is that it is too lengthy (~9000 words) for what is shown. For instance, there’s a presentation of satellite chlorophyll images with a couple pages of discussion and then field fluorescence data and then finally an acknowledgment that the discrepancy between satellite and inferred in situ chlorophyll likely reflects CDOM interference on the images. Likewise there’s a fair bit of text about why no hypoxia was observed on the shelf following the storm....since this is all fairly speculative, I think it could and should be condensed. That said, one topic that could use a little commentary (i.e., just a few sentences) is comparisons with other post-hurricane coastal studies. Just a brief ‘what’s similar/what’s different’ summation could be of interest.
Some additional comments:
1. At various spots in the text, including tables, numbers are presented with two much implied precision (significant figures). In some cases this may have resulted from a conversion from English units to metric (e.g., the <1.29 µM PO4 in Table 3 which was probably originally <40 µg-P/L).
2. A number of the figures have text in too small a font to be able to read. Even ODV can have its default font settings changed (and, you can even get it to show a µ rather than a u). Also, for the figures that have multiple parts representing different cruises, it would be nice if the dates were shown on each sub-plot rather than making the reader go to the caption.
3. A minor point, but in Table 1, the caption starts with “Precipitation rates (cm)”. I am afraid that cm is an amount, not a rate. I suspect these numbers are cm/mo.
4. On Fig. 4, there are some contour wobbles near the coastline that are not supported by data. Adjusting the ODV contouring parameters or masking out the near shore might be helpful.
5. Table 2: no units are provided.
6. Lines 348-350: Ammonia was variable and in greater abundance than nitrate, but DIN follows nitrate? I am confused.
7. There are lots of little grammar and style errors. For instance, µM/L is used in a few spots (including the text, a table, and a figure)...it should either be µM or µmol/L.
8. Lines 425-432: The authors seem to be saying that nutrients were removed in the bays fairly rapidly by blooms. But also, they indicate that Galveston Bay was flushed with 3-5x its volume of freshwater. And, later in the paper they allude to a flushing or rate-limitation effect in which the initial runoff is high in nutrients and then the source gets depleted. So, couldn’t the fall in bay nutrients have resulted from the rapid flushing of the bay by a diminishing nutrient source?
9. Lines 445-446: This is a little confusing. Previously you’ve said that you didn’t see shelf hypoxia. Now you mention that some other nearby systems “similarly showed rapid short-term nutrient increases followed by hypoxia”. I think this just needs some slight rewording because “similarly” implies that you did see hypoxia in your study area.
10. Figure 7: a location map would be helpful. Also, are these surface or bottom samples?
11. Lines 450-457: “This is not unexpected given the solubility of nitrate ions relative to the other two.” Please provide a reference.
12. Line 544: chlorophyll a
13. Hopefully, the note in the acknowledgments that the data ‘are being submitted’ will be updated to ‘the data are available at’ by the time of any revisions to the manuscript.Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-1075-RC1 -
AC1: 'Reply on RC1 and RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
The comment was uploaded in the form of a supplement: https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2022/egusphere-2022-1075/egusphere-2022-1075-AC1-supplement.pdf
-
AC1: 'Reply on RC1 and RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
-
RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2022-1075', Anonymous Referee #2, 20 Nov 2022
General Comment:
To understand the effects of Hurricane Harvey on Texas coastal zone chemistry, especially inorganic nutrients and dissolved oxygen. The authors used five cruises measurements, two pre- and three post-hurricane, with data on temperature, salinity, dissolved inorganic nutrients, DO, and fluorescence at stations along Texas coastal zone, Gulf of Mexico. In addition, both wind and current data were retrieved from website of the TABS moorings system along the Texas coast and the National Data Buoy Center. To evidence the phytoplankton dynamics at pre- and post-hurricane periods, satellite imagery was used and downloaded from the NASA Goddard ocean color website. I appreciate and admire the amount of data set of this ms.
I appreciate they provided a lot of data set, especially the field data. The results showed that even with intense terrestrial runoff due to rainfall caused by hurricane, nutrient supply to the coastal ocean was transient and with little phytoplankton growth and no hypoxia in coastal zone after hurricane. To demonstrate and explain those results and outcomes, a lot of data has been applied. However, I do find out that the whole manuscript mostly only stated the observed results but lacked of the significant scientific evidences, especially without supporting by statistical evidences. In addition, the presentation of this ms should be in a more logistic way and provided the organized and sorted information; the unnecessary details normally will distract the way of thinking and reading of the reader. In the text, there are also many local names has been addressed when described the data, and they should be clearly labeled in the map. Otherwise, it will confuse the international reader, especially for whom do not familiar with this region. Overall, I do feel this ms was very descriptive and it should be concise and focus on the main theme of this Hurricane effect with supporting evidences from this study.
Specific comments:
Introduction:
In the introduction, you might want to focus on what we have known about the phenomena, e.g., variables or ecosystems response to hurricane’s impact. Therefore, you may consider to simplify or trim the unnecessary details regarding description on hurricanes and Hurricane Harvey.
lines 31-39. This can be simplified by one sentence.
lines 55-59, again, too much unnecessary details on Hurricane Harvey, and you might only focus on its heavy rainfall here.
lines 73-94, same as previous comments.
Methods:
lines 130-133, all the instrument should provide the company info.
line 155-156, please indicate whether the fluorometer data has been calibrated with in-situ Chl a data or not.
Results:
line 153, You may want to consider to present wind field (not shown in this study) and current movement data together. It will then better show the impact of hurricane and other conditions on both variables.
line 189, 191, Traditionally, reference(s) is not cited in the Results section.
line 218, you may want to present the measured temperature as supplementary information.
line 227, again, reference.
line 299, reference again.
lines 329-330, references again.
Discussion.
This is a very long Discussion section, you may want to consider to separate it into different subtitles, e.g., impact on the Bay regions, inner shelf, offshore, phytoplankton, as well as oxygen dynamics?
lines 551-552, Sabine Lake to Port Aransas Bay, the name should be marked or labeled in the map.
lines 589-590, please consistent with the unit of same variable throughout the ms, e.g., μg/L and mg m-3.
lines 600-603, so, the satellite-derived results might mislead the interpretation of your results?
lines 608-618, I believe the statement regarding hypoxia formation has been well known, and you may want to simplify it here.
Lines 659-719, four factors have been proposed to explain why there was no hypoxia following Hurricane Harvey. The direct evidences of those factors should be provided to support your idea and persuade the reader.
Table 1, rates (cm hr-1)? If so, please revise it. Also, you should present the locations of precipitation in the sampling map. Please also consider move this table to supplementary information.
Fig. 1, You might want to mark and indicate the sampling area in this figure. The reader will have better idea where the stations located.
Fig. 2, Please remove or describe the undescribed label in the figure. e.g., Yellow triangle X. Also, please mark the line(s) which mentioned in the text, e.g., line 3.
Fig. 3, You might want to combined all panel (A, B, C, and D) of each buoy’s data into a longer time period and also marked your pre- and post-hurricane sampling periods and hurricane period in the longer time panel’s data plot. In this way, the reader can clearly picture all the time frame of your study.
You may want to consider to combine Fig. 1-3 into one figure or at least Fig. 1 and 2. It will provide a clear picture for the reader regarding your study site, sampling period, and current condition of your study.
Fig. 4, it will be easier to follow your description if Mississippi-Atchafalaya river system, Galveston Bay, and Matagorda Bay are marked on the map.
Fig. 5, y-axis, the water column depth should mark with minus sign; Please mark pycnocline in DO profiles. Also, please clearly indicate which September cruise for this data set (I know which cruise, but it still should be clearly indicated in the caption).
Fig. S3, it is more make sense to me if you reverse x- and y-axes plot of this figure.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-1075-RC2 -
AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
See comments submitted to RC1 (contains replies to both reviewers)
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2022-1075-AC2
-
AC2: 'Reply on RC2', Piers Chapman, 11 Jan 2023
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Steven F. DiMarco
Anthony H. Knap
Antonietta Quigg
Nan D. Walker
The requested preprint has a corresponding peer-reviewed final revised paper. You are encouraged to refer to the final revised version.
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- Final revised paper