Mark Bushnell has over forty years of experience in blue water and coastal oceanography. Shortly after obtaining his degree, he was employed by NOAA’s environmental research laboratory in Miami. There he was engaged in a variety of tropical and subtropical oceanographic and climate change studies, working with emerging technologies and developing novel sensors and systems for twenty years. This positioned him well for his move to NOAA’s National Ocean Service where he initiated and managed the ocean systems test and evaluation program, transitioning new technologies to an operational capability. He participated in the design of NOAA’s Physical Oceanographic Real-Time Systems (PORTS) – a Federal/private partnership supporting safe and efficient maritime commerce in US ports.
Mr. Bushnell retired from NOAA in 2010 and transitioned into oceanographic consulting. Federal, state, university, and private sector organizations contract him for supporting METOC activities. Recent work has focused on quality control of real-time oceanographic data, oceanographic best practices documentation, wave model and forecast validation observations, coastal subsidence studies associated with sea level rise, oceanographic data uncertainty quantification.