Using Oil Spill Modeling in Oil Spill Exercises and Drills

ABSTRACT Oil spill trajectory and fate modeling was used in inland response Full Scale Exercises including the Enbridge Des Plains River (fall 2018) and Wisconsin River (fall 2019). The Spill Impact Model Application Package (SIMAP) was used to predict the three-dimensional movement (i.e. trajectory) and behavior (i.e. fate) of a hypothetical release of oil using site-specific environmental and geographic conditions (including seasonal and hydrographic information) for the date of the exercise. The RPS OILMAPLand model was also used to predict the two-dimensional movement and behavior of the oil over the land surface, before it was predicted to enter the waterway. The oil spill modeling evaluated the spatial extent, timing, and magnitude of hydrocarbon contamination at downstream locations including thicknesses of floating surface oil and the mass of oil on shorelines and sediments. The assessments included the potential for released oil to move over the land surface, before entering the waterway, as well as becoming entrained in the water column as a result of surface floating oil passing over local features such as locks and dams. The results were presented at two separate exercise planning session and the full scale exercise as static images, GIS shape files, and videos. Results were also included in the COP for the exercise itself, with predicted results provided at hourly intervals for several days.

Finding Fields: Locating Archaeological Agricultural Landscapes Using Historical Aerial Photographs

During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, over 450 precolumbian and historic Indigenous agricultural fields were documented across the state of Wisconsin. Today, the vast majority of these features are generally assumed to have been destroyed. Focusing on the Wisconsin River basin, which has the highest concentration of known archaeological field systems in the Midwest, this study explores the potential of using historical aerial photographs to identify and interpret archaeological agricultural features. Relying on state site records, an archive of high-resolution 1930s aerial images, and modern lidar data, we carefully examine the region surrounding 59 sites where fields had previously been documented. At a quarter of the sites we investigated, we successfully identified both known and unrecorded archaeological features—including agricultural fields, effigy mounds, earthworks, and house basins—most of which have been destroyed by recent land use practices. Our analysis sheds light on the complexity and richness of the archaeological landscape, with vast agricultural spaces situated beyond traditional site boundaries, and suggests that precolumbian and historic Indigenous agricultural fields may have been much larger and more widespread than conventionally understood.

Multidecade Mortality and a Homolog of Hepatitis C Virus in Bald Eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), the National Bird of the USA

The bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) once experienced near-extinction but has since rebounded. For decades, bald eagles near the Wisconsin River, USA, have experienced a lethal syndrome with characteristic clinical and pathological features but unknown etiology. Here, we describe a novel hepacivirus-like virus (Flaviviridae: Hepacivirus) identified during an investigation of Wisconsin River eagle syndrome (WRES). Bald eagle hepacivirus (BeHV) belongs to a divergent clade of avian viruses that share features with members of the genera Hepacivirus and Pegivirus. BeHV infected 31.9% of eagles spanning 4,254 km of the coterminous USA, with negative strand viral RNA demonstrating active replication in liver tissues. Eagles from Wisconsin were approximately 10-fold more likely to be infected than eagles from elsewhere. Eagle mitochondrial DNA sequences were homogeneous and geographically unstructured, likely reflecting a recent population bottleneck, whereas BeHV envelope gene sequences showed strong population genetic substructure and isolation by distance, suggesting localized transmission. Cophylogenetic analyses showed no congruity between eagles and their viruses, supporting horizontal rather than vertical transmission. These results expand our knowledge of the Flaviviridae, reveal a striking pattern of decoupled host/virus coevolution on a continental scale, and highlight knowledge gaps about health and conservation in even the most iconic of wildlife species.

The Effect of Psychological Perspectives on Stigmatic Thinking Regarding Mental Disorders [University of Wisconsin River Falls]

This study examined how an individual’s psychological perspective affects stigmatic thinking regarding mental disorders. Several research studies have examined how different explanations for mental disorders contribute to stigmatic thinking. For example, research done by Lebowitz et.al (2013) found that biochemical and genetic attributions for depression were associated with prognostic pessimism. Another study done by Lebowitz & Ahn (2014), found that mental health clinicians who held a biological perspective reported less empathy towards those who experience depression than did those that held psychosocial perspectives. Up until now, researchers have only differentiated between broad biological and psychological perspectives. This study went beyond previous research by breaking down both the biological and psychological perspectives into narrower theoretical explanations; and by attempting to assess the individual theoretical perspectives of each participant. The goal of this study was to determine whether different psychological perspectives of mental disorders related to stigmatic thinking.

Headwinds

This chapter explores how the loss of Prairie du Chien dealt a heavy blow at the British stronghold on Mackinac Island. Construction of Fort Shelby threatened the route by which the British supplied their Indian allies on the Mississippi. Supplies could still be distributed at Green Bay, Chicago, but for western tribes such as the Sioux and the Sauk, the Wisconsin River route was essential. Even to supply his own soldiers with food proved a constant struggle for the British commandant at Mackinac, and the constant throng of hungry allied Indians, usually accompanied by their families, often forced him to choose between depriving his own troops and alienating the Indians. The other danger threatening Mackinac was an American task force gathering under the command of Colonel George Croghan to retake the island.

Bridge extreme stress prediction based on Bayesian dynamic linear models and non-uniform sampling

Bridge monitoring systems produce a large amount of data, including uniform and non-uniform sampled data in the long-term service periods; the proper handling of these data is one of the main difficulties in structural health monitoring. To properly predict structural non-uniform extreme stress and deal with the uncertainties of the monitored data, the objectives of this article are to present (a) Bayesian dynamic linear models about non-uniform extreme stress, (b) monitoring mechanism about the Bayesian dynamic linear models based on single and cumulative Bayes’ factors, and (c) an effective use of the Bayesian dynamic linear models to incorporate the dynamic monitored data into structural non-uniform extreme stress prediction. The proposed models and procedure are applied to the monitored data obtained from the I-39 Northbound Bridge over the Wisconsin River in Wausau, Wisconsin, USA.