Oil and gas exploration in America

Captains

Alaska's North Slope, the Chukchi Sea and the Beaufort Sea inevitably come to mind as one wonders about the future of oil and gas exploration in the post-Deepwater Horizon years. One thing I learned during my Gulf of Mexico experience is that local leadership matters. The Gulf Coast mayors are dealing with the aftermath of BP's Mississippi Canyon drilling accident. Mayor Itta of the Alaska North Slope is dealing with BP, Shell, and ConocoPhillips before they drill in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas.

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Alaska politician Edward Itta, an Inupiat Eskimo, stands at the center of our country's struggle to balance environmental and energy demands

by Bob Reiss

published: 07/18/2010

Edward Itta, 65, may be one of America’s most powerful mayors—but you’ve probably never heard of him. He governs the Wyoming-sized North Slope Borough of Alaska, a territory larger than 39 of our 50 states. However, his influence doesn’t come from the size of that area but from what lies beneath the land and its adjacent waters. The North Slope contains the country’s largest oil field, Prudhoe Bay, which is now producing less than one-third of its former peak flow. The next great energy find—up to 27 billion barrels of oil and 132 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, according to U.S. government sources—is thought to be under the Chukchi and Beaufort seas, directly offshore from the North Slope.

LORAN termination

Captains,
Of all the LORAN Stations, the six in Alaska were the most challenging to operate due to the remoteness and harsh environment. Alaska mariners benefited from having a strong Loran signal for many years. Now GPS takes over as the only electronic navigation system.
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KODIAK, Alaska - Crews at the Coast Guard Long Range Aids to Navigation stations, including the six Alaska-based stations, turned off their domestic signal across the nation at 11 a.m. Monday.
The shutdown of the signal concludes the broadcast of the U.S. domestic signal. Stations Attu and Shoal Cove, which are bound by bi-lateral agreements with Russia and Canada, will continue to broadcast their international signals until later this year. All the stations will continue to be maintained and manned as the closure of the facilities proceeds over the coming months. Decommissioning dates have yet to be set and plans for the dismantlement of the stations are in development.
Loran-C was originally developed to provide radio-navigation service for U.S. coastal waters and was later expanded to include complete coverage of the continental U.S. as well as most of Alaska. Twenty-four U.S. Loran-C stations work in partnership with Canadian and Russian stations to provide coverage in Canadian waters and the Bering Sea. The system provided better than 0.25 nautical mile absolute accuracy for within the published areas and provided navigation, location, and timing services for both civil and military air, land and marine users. It was approved as an en route supplemental air navigation system for both Instrument Flight Rule and Visual Flight Rule operations.
The Loran-C system served the 48 continental states, their coastal areas, parts of Alaska and neighboring countries. Dedicated Coast Guard men and women have done an excellent job running and maintaining the Loran-C signal for 67 years, 8 months and 24 days. It is a service and mission of which the entire Coast Guard can be proud.