Refugio GNOME NRDA: NOAA Modeled Shoreline Oiling Hindcast for 2015 Spill

NOAA's GNOME model hindcast of oil particles reaching the shoreline from the May 2015 Refugio State Beach pipeline rupture. The dataset is produced by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Office of Response and Restoration for Natural Resource Damage Assessment. It models the spread of an estimated 21,000 gallons of oil into the Pacific Ocean from Santa Barbara County, California.

Use Cases

• Modeling oil spill trajectory and shoreline contamination based on the GNOME hindcast methodology described.
• Assessing environmental damage for Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) based on the described spill impacts.
• Planning coastal restoration efforts based on the modeled extent of shoreline oiling.
• Studying hazard mitigation strategies for future spills based on the historical Refugio Beach incident.

Strengths

• Produced by the authoritative National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
• Focuses on a specific, documented environmental incident with a stated date (May 19, 2015) and location.
• Based on a recognized scientific model (GNOME) for oil spill trajectory.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is provided in PDF and HTML formats, which may require extraction for computational analysis.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

Collection Method

NOAA GNOME modeled hindcast of oil particles.

Time Range

Related to the May 19, 2015 spill event.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 22:23:33.436714; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Santa Barbara County, California, USA, specifically Refugio State Beach and the Pacific Ocean.