FAIRHOPE — The University of South Alabama Baldwin County begins its new Distinguished Lecture Series at the bottom … literally. “A Little Bit of Heaven, a Little Bit of Hell: Sub-Marine Effects of Gulf Coast Hurricanes” examines the effect individual hurricanes had on two Gulf Coast estuaries.

Dr. Wayne Isphording, as USA professor emeritus, will speak on Sunday, Oct. 14, from 2 to 3:30 p.m., at the USA Baldwin County Performance Center, on the corner of St. James Avenue and Summit Street in Fairhope.

He will explore what he discovered during separate studies of Mobile and Appalachicola bays after hurricanes came ashore nearby.

Isphording said he will touch on the effect the passage of Hurricane Frederic had on the topography and sediment in Mobile Bay when it roared ashore in 1979. He will also discuss his study of Appalachicola Bay, Fla. before and after Hurricane Elena made landfall in 1985.

Each of these was profoundly impacted by a hurricane event which, according to Isphording, had positive and negative effects.

“I’ve worked as a consultant for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the United States Fish and Wildlife Service,” he said. “I conducted two detailed studies. In both of these bays, I studied various properties of the bottoms of the bays.”

Isphording said the studies had nothing at first to do with hurricanes, but more than 300 points in each bay were sampled and logged. Data was saved, along with Global Positioning System (GPS) coordinates. In both cases, the hurricanes made possible a line of study that had never before been done in the U.S.

“The federal agencies sent us back out and we sampled each site again,” Isphording said. “It’s the only time it was ever done. We looked at what changes occurred in the sediment, and what was affected by the hurricanes. (During the lecture), I’ll run through both of these cases and show what changed, including how much material was removed during each of these hurricanes.”

Isphording noted around 89 million tons was displaced from Appalachicola Bay by Elena, and another 290 million tons was moved from Mobile Bay by Frederic. The latter is nearly equal to the amount of sediment moved by the Mississippi River each year.

He added, “I didn’t realize a hurricane could suspend and remove that much material. Elena literally sandblasted that (Appalachicola) bay and cut chasms in the oyster reefs, which account for 85 percent of all oysters harvested in Florida.”

Isphording pointed out that a notorious 2005 storm made landfall too far away from the area to have the same type of impact on Mobile Bay, even though many homes along the Alabama coast were flooded.

“Hurricane Frederic took just the right path to do that,” he said. “Katrina passed too far to the west to do that. It would have had to move just to the west of Mobile Bay.”

Happenstance facilitated the research Isphording will detail Sunday afternoon. He said, “I was incredibly fortuitous to be working on both of those.”

Isphording is an internationally renowned forensic geologist who has lectured in many countries and throughout the United States.

USA Baldwin County established the Distinguished Lecture Series as a way to educate the community on various topics from the environment to Alzheimer’s Disease.

Dr. Christine Bogar, the assistant director of student services, said, “The Distinguished Lecture Series brings local experts with regional, national and international acclaim to the Baldwin County campus in Fairhope. Community members are invited to join our students, faculty and staff for these extraordinary lectures, guaranteed to enlighten and inform us on topics that really matter.”

The lecture series is free, and space is limited. Call (251) 928-8133 today to reserve your seat. To find out more about future speakers, you may also e-mail usabc@usouthal.edu.