Introduction

Commencement Bay is the port harbor for Tacoma, Washington.  It is a body of water located near the southern end of the Puget Sound.  Puget Sound is an estuary, a body of water that is partially contained and exhibits both salt and freshwater.  In the last few decades, Commencement Bay has become home to one of the most active commercial ports in the world.  In the early 1900s, this area consisted of intertidal areas and tideflats of the Puyallup River Delta.   The aforementioned areas were later filled in and the meandering streams were channelized.  As a result, the area was transformed into eight waterways: Hylebos, Blair, Sitcum, Milwaukee, St. Paul, Middle, Thea Foss, and Wheeler-Osgood that presently lead into the bay.

Each of the water ways are home to numerous industries. They include pulp and lumber mills, shipbuilding and ship repair facilities, shipping docks, marinas, chlorine and chemical production facilities, concrete production facilities, aluminum smelting facilities, oil refineries, food processing plants, automotive repair shops, railroad operations, and numerous other storage, transportation, and chemical manufacturing companies.  In addition, there are numerous drains, pipes, seeps, open channels, and other point and nonpoint discharges deposit into the bay everyday.

Several of Commencement Bay's waterways provide a source of freshwater to the bay.  The most significant of these waterways is the Puyallup River. The Puyallup drains approximately 4000 ft³/sec during the month of May on average from Mount Rainer to the Puget Lowlands (USGS 2006).   The Puyallup River discharges about 94 cubic meters per second of sediment rich water into Commencement Bay (USGS 2006)..  Others freshwater systems include Ruston Creek, Mason Creek, Asarco Creek, Puget Creek, Hylebos Creek, and Wapato Creek.  Commencement Bay also receives the effluent of a large municipal wastewater treatment plant and a nearby pulp mill.  The treatment facility discharges an average of 51 million gallons of secondarily treated wastewater per day.  Contaminates originate from both point and nonpoint sources. There are 763 drains (pipes), seeps, open channels, and other point and nonpoint discharges into Commencement Bay (EPA).

In this study, we acquired CTD measurements, collected water, sediment, day and night time plankton samples for analysis.  The mission was to update the data collected and compare with previous years sampled. The areas marked on the map are approximations of where we sampled in Commencement Bay (Figure 1).

Map

www.mapquest.com

Station Coordinate

STATION	LATIDUE	LONGITUDE	DATE/TIME
1 : Point Defiance	47 18.302’N	122 30.304’W	04/21/06 @ 10:45 PDT
2 : Outer Bay	47 18.290’N	122 28.239’W	04/21/06 @ 11:40 PDT
3 : Browns Point	47 18.392’N	122 26.968’W	04/21/06 @ 12:55 PDT
5 : Hylebos	47 17.209'N	122 24.925'W	04/21/06 @ 14:48 PDT
6 : Sewage Outfall	47 16.673'N	122 25.296'W	04/21/06 @ 15:37 PDT
7 : Puyallup River	47 16.465'N	122 25.872'W	04/21/06 @ 16:12 PDT
8 : Thea Foss	47 15.830'N	122 26.319'W	04/21/06 @ 16:50 PDT

References

Greengrove, Cheryl. University of Washington. TESC 431; Water Resources and Pollution; Estuarine Field Studies: Oceanography 101. Lecture. April 27, 2006.
NOAA; National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration. Northwest Region May 27, 2006. www.darp.noaa.gov/northwest/cbay USGS; United States Geological Survey. Puyallup River at Puyallup. May 27, 2006. http://waterdata.usgs.gov/wa/nwis/uv?12101500 EPA; Environmental Protection Agency. Commencenment Bay. May 27. 2006. http://www.epa.gov/superfund/programs/recycle/success/1-pagers/commenc.htm

Acknowledgements

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