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Sonar Mapping

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Sonar mapping of the sea floor provides CMG researchers with very useful data. Some sonar systems map the topography of the sea floor by recording large swaths of depth measurements. Others collect information useful in determining the geologic makeup of the sea floor and the sub-surface structure.

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Educational Materials

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Items below are listed from most recently updated to least recently updated.

These are results 1 through 25 of 186 matches.

Educational Materials
Equipment Used in Marine Geology Research

Description: Description and links to information on nine types of marine geology research equipment used by the USGS Western Region Coastal & Marine Geology Team
updated: 2009-07-02 pages include:

General Information
WCMG Marine Facility Home Page

Description: Links to software downloads and documentation for YoNav and MudSeis systems used on Western Region Coastal and Marine Geology Team cruises.
updated: 2009-07-02 pages include:

Publication
General Information Product 57: South San Francisco Bay, California

Description: The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the California Coastal Conservancy and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, mapped the floor of south San Francisco Bay and adjoining land using single-beam sonar and airborne lidar (light detection and ranging). To learn more, visit http://pubs.usgs.gov/sim/2007/2987/.
updated: 2009-06-17 pages include:

Educational Materials
Tsunami and Earthquake Research at the USGS

Description: General information on how earthquakes generate tsunamis and summaries of tsunami research.
updated: 2009-06-10 pages include:

Publication
General Information Product 87: Sea Floor off San Diego, California

Description: Ocean-floor image generated from multibeam-bathymetry data acquired by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS); Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution; Scripps Institution of Oceanography; California State University, Monterey Bay; and Fugro Pelagos. To learn more, visit http://pubs.usgs.gov/sim/2007/2959/.
updated: 2009-06-03 pages include:

Research Project
USGS Northern Gulf of Mexico (NGOM)

Description: The goal of the USGS Northern Gulf of Mexico project is to understand the evolution of coastal ecosystems on the Northern Gulf Coast, the impact of human activities on these ecosystems, and the vulnerability of ecosystems and human communities to more frequent and more intense hurricanes in the future.
updated: 2009-05-28 pages include:

Map
National Seafloor Mapping and Characterization

Description: Images of the sea floor off the coasts of California, Hawaii, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, and Washington; images of lake floor of Lake Michigan, Crater Lake, Lake Tahoe. Backscatter and swath bathymetry, regular and in 3-D view.
updated: 2009-05-11 pages include:

Publication
Open-File Report 2009-1029: Coastal processes study of Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties, California

Description: By Patrick L. Barnard, David L. Revell, Dan Hoover, Jon Warrick, John Brocatus, Amy E. Draut, Pete Dartnell, Edwin Elias, Neomi Mustain, Pat E. Hart, and Holly F. Ryan. The Santa Barbara littoral cell (SBLC) is a complex coastal system with significant management challenges. The coastline ranges broadly in exposure to wave energy, fluvial inputs, hard structures, and urbanization. Geologic influence (structural control) on coastline orientation exerts an important control on local beach behavior, with anthropogenic alterations and the episodic nature of sediment supply and transport also playing important roles.
updated: 2009-03-27 pages include:

Publication
Digital Data Series 72: 2000 Multibeam sonar survey of Crater Lake, Oregon - Data, GIS, images, and movies

Description: In the summer of 2000, the bottom of Crater Lake, Oregon was mapped. The effort was a cooperative effort between the U.S. Geological Survey's Pacific Seafloor Mapping Project, the National Park Service, and the Center for Coastal and Ocean Mapping at the University of New Hampshire. The team used a state-of-the-art multibeam sonar system to collect high-resolution bathymetry and calibrated, co-registered acoustic backscatter to support both biological and geological research in the area (aquatic biology, geochemistry, volcanic processes, etc). This survey collected over 16 million soundings and the resulting data portrays the bottom of Crater Lake at a spatial resolution of 2 meters. This CD-ROM is published for the scientific community, the general public, and as a teaching tool. The CD-ROM contains the raw multibeam bathymetry and backscatter data as well as an ArcExplorer 2.0 project for the scientific community to use in research. Computer-generated images and a fly-by movie allow any user to visualize the lake floor. Photographs and a QuickTime� movie of the helicopter operations shows how the multibeam survey took place and a list of Crater Lake publications and related websites can be used for further Crater Lake research and general interest.
updated: 2009-03-10 pages include:

Publication
USGS Gulf Coast Science Conference and Florida Integrated Science Center Meeting: Proceedings with Abstracts, October 20-23, 2008, Orlando, Florida

Description: Talks, posters, and abstracts from the USGS Gulf Coast Science Conference and Florida Integrated Science Center Meeting.
updated: 2009-01-29 pages include:

Publication
Scientific Investigations Report 2007-5101: The Coral Reef of South Moloka�i, Hawai�i�Portrait of a Sediment-Threatened Fringing Reef

Description: In this landmark volume, U.S. Geological Survey researchers and their colleagues have developed and applied a remarkably integrated approach to the reefs of Moloka�i, combining geology, oceanography, and biology to provide an in-depth understanding of the processes that have made these reefs grow and that now limit them. They have joined old fashioned natural history of marine animals and plants with study of the geological evolution of the island, hydrology, meteorology, and land-use history, to an arsenal of new methods of remote sensing, including aerial photography, laser ranging, infrared thermal mapping, seismic reflection, in-situ instrumentation to measure chemical parameters of water quality, and direct measurements of the physical driving forces affecting them�such as wave energy, currents, sedimentation, and sediment transport. They provide a level of documentation and insight that has never been available for any reef before.
updated: 2008-11-19 pages include:

Publication
USGS OFR 2007-1366: Sidescan-Sonar Imagery and Surficial Geologic Interpretations of the Sea Floor in Central Rhode Island Sound, Title Page

Description: Sidescan-sonar imagery, bathymetry, and surficial geologic interpretations of the sea floor in Rhode Island Sound, Rhode Island.
updated: 2008-11-17 pages include:

Publication
USGS OFR 2008-1174: Enhanced Sidescan-Sonar Imagery, North-Central Long Island Sound, Title Page

Description: Sidescan-sonar imagery from NOAA surveys H11043, H11044, and H11045 in north-central Long Island Sound were enhanced to remove tonal artifacts by matching backscatter tones in adjacent sonar lines. The enhanced imagery minimizes abrupt backscatter changes and striping, and more clearly delineates boundaries of backscatter tones and patterns."
updated: 2008-11-17 pages include:

Publication
USGS OFR 2008-1004: Sea-Floor Character and Sedimentary Processes in the Vicinity of Woods Hole, Massachusetts, Title Page

Description: Sea-floor geology and surface processes of Woods Hole based on sidescan sonar, multibeam bathymetry, bottom photography, and sediment samples."
updated: 2008-11-17 pages include:

Publication
GIS Compilation, Data Collected, Pulley Ridge Deep Coral Reef Region, USGS OF 2005-1089, Title Page

Description: GIS compilation of data from the southern portion of Pulley Ridge on the Florida Platform.
updated: 2008-10-11 pages include:

Publication
Open-File Report 98-139: Multibeam Data and Socio-Economic Issues in West-Central San Francisco Bay

Description: Recent investigations by the USGS in the San Francisco Bay estuary help address both socio-economic and scientific issues: - How much rock must be trimmed from pinnacles on the bayfloor to provide safe navigation by deep-draft vessels? - What would be the environmental and societal consequences of a large oil spill? - What are the consequences of long-term dredging operations? - What types of bayfloor are important habitats for commercial and recreational fisheries? - What types of sediment cover the bayfloor? - What are the sediment distribution, volume, and rates of transport?
updated: 2008-10-10 pages include:

Research Project
WCMG Coastal Processes Studies

Description: California's beaches and nearshore regions are valuable economic and recreational resources but also provide habitats for numerous sensitive species. During winter storms, the coast represents a potentially dangerous interface between ocean and land, nature and humans. Storms produce high waves, strong currents, and elevated sea level that can rapidly erode beaches and inundate low-lying coastal regions, damaging and/or destroying public and private infrastructure as well as stressing coastal ecosystems. Over longer-time scales (e.g. decadal), persistent erosion exacerbated by the pressures of coastal development, reduction in sediment availability and climate change, can result in severely depleted beaches. The USGS performs research along the California coast to understand the physical processes that control coastal change on time scales from individual storms to decades to support the efforts of local, state and government agencies to make informed coastal management decisions to most effectively preserve and protect this valuable resource.
updated: 2008-09-23 pages include:

General Information
USGS WCMG News, Scientists Map Unexplored Arctic Sea Floor

Description: News and Information about the USGS research aboard the US Coast Guard Cutter Healy, mapping the sea floor - the extended continental shelf - in the Artic Ocean this month. This research is being done to define the limits of the extended continental shelf, over which coastal nations can claim sovereign rights under the United Nations Convension on the Law of the Sea.
updated: 2008-09-23 pages include:

Research Project
Southern California Coastal Hazards - USGS WCMG

Description: Southern California Coastal Hazards Study of the USGS Western Coastal and Marine Geology Team
updated: 2008-09-23 pages include:

Research Project
Coastal Processes: San Francisco Bight Coastal Processes Study - USGS WCMG

Description: San Francisco Bight Coastal Processes Study of the USGS Western Coastal and Marine Geology Team. The USGS is conducting a study that documents and analyzes the processes that control the sand transport and sedimentation patterns of Ocean Beach, a National Park site within the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. This area encompasses a complicated coastal setting that is impacted by the tidal influence of San Francisco Bay, as well as the southwest and northwest Pacific swell. High-energy conditions at this site have restricted comprehensive field surveys in the past, but recent innovations in field techniques now make it possible to perform detailed analysis of the physical processes operating on high energy coastlines, such as Ocean Beach.
updated: 2008-08-12 pages include:

Research Project
Santa Barbara-Ventura Coastal Processes Study - USGS WCMG

Description: Santa Barbara/Ventura Coastal Processes Study of the USGS Western Coastal and Marine Geology Team. Whereas coastal urban development and infrastructure are largely fixed with respect to location, shoreline and bluff positions can change substantially over time in response to natural processes. These natural coastal changes can damage or undermine urban structures, resulting in substantial property loss for federal, state, local and individual land owners. Urban development can also indirectly influence coastal change by interrupting natural supplies or transport of sediment in littoral cells. Thus, it is important to evaluate the rates, patterns and causes of coastal change to better manage sediment resources and predict change hazards in coastal urban settings. The Santa Barbara and Ventura County coast represents a littoral cell along the California coast extending from (at least) Point Conception to the Mugu submarine canyon. The beaches along this littoral cell are an important economic resource to the region, and there is evidence that shoreline and bluff erosion are impacting these beaches. Coastal change in the Santa Barbara/Ventura region is complicated, however, by the irregular coastline (there are numerous rocky headlands, river deltas and offshore reefs), variability in wave forcing, structures such as harbors, groins, piers, dams and landscape urbanization, variability in tectonic uplift, and limited information on littoral sediment sources. In response to the potential for coastal change, BEACON (Beach Erosion Authority for Clean Oceans and Nourishment) and the City of Carpinteria have provided a combined $700K in funding for USGS WCMG to evaluate the coastal change patterns and processes along the Santa Barbara/Ventura County coast until the end of 2008.
updated: 2008-08-12 pages include:

Publication
Open-File Report 2008-1246: High-Resolution Chirp and Mini-Sparker Seismic-Reflection Data From the Southern California Continental Shelf�Gaviota to Mugu Canyon

Description: The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) collected high-resolution shallow seismic-reflection data in September, 2007, and June-July, 2008, from the continental shelf offshore of southern California between Gaviota and Mugu Canyon, in support of the California's State Waters Mapping Program. Data were acquired using SIG 2mille mini-sparker and Edgetech chirp 512 instruments aboard the R/V Zephyr (Sept. 2007) and R/V Parke Snavely (June-July 2008). The survey area spanned approximately 120 km of coastline, and included shore-perpendicular transects spaced 1.0-1.5 km apart that extended offshore to at least the 3-mile limit of State waters, in water depths ranging from 10 m near shore to 300 m near the offshore extent of Mugu and Hueneme submarine canyons. Subbottom acoustic penetration spanned tens to several hundred meters, variable by location. This report includes maps of the surveyed transects, linked to Google Earth� software, as well as digital data files showing images of each transect in SEG-Y, JPEG, and TIFF formats. The images of sediment deposits, tectonic structure, and natural-gas seeps collected during this study provide geologic information that is essential to coastal zone and resource management at Federal, State and local levels, as well as to future research on the sedimentary, tectonic, and climatic record of southern California.
updated: 2008-07-29 pages include:

Publication
Scientific Investigations Map 3007: Views of the Sea Floor in Northern Monterey Bay, California

Description: A sonar survey that produced unprecedented high-resolution images of the sea floor in northern Monterey Bay was conducted in 2005 and 2006. The survey, performed over 14 days by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), consisted of 172 tracklines and over 300 million soundings and covered an area of 12.2 km2 (4.7 mi2). The goals of this survey were to collect high-resolution bathymetry (depth to the sea floor) and acoustic backscatter data (amount of sound energy bounced back from the sea floor, which provides information on sea-floor hardness and texture) from the inner continental shelf. These data will provide a baseline for future change analyses, geologic mapping, sediment- and contaminant-transport studies, benthic-habitat delineation, and numerical modeling efforts. The survey shows that the inner shelf in this area is extremely varied in nature, encompassing flat sandy areas, faults, boulder fields, and complex bedrock ridges that support rich marine ecosystems. Furthermore, many of these complex bedrock ridges form the �reefs� that result in a number of California�s classic surf breaks.
updated: 2008-06-09 pages include:

Publication
Data Series 320: Sea-Floor Mapping and Benthic Habitat GIS for the Elwha River Delta Nearshore, Washington

Description: This is a description of selected data layers for the Sea-Floor Mapping and Benthic Habitat GIS for Puget Sound, Washington. From March 1531, 2005, more than 252 km (19.5 km2) of seafloor offshore of the Elwha River Delta in the central Strait of Juan de Fuca was mapped by the USGS Coastal and Marine Geology Program. The purpose of this nearshore mapping was to (1) obtain high resolution bathymetry and acoustic reflectance properties of the seabed, (2) examine and record geologic characteristics of the seafloor, and (3) construct maps of sea-floor geomorphology and habitat. Substrate distribution was characterized with video-supervised statistical classification of the sonar data. Substrate of the survey was dominated by mixed sand-gravel and sand. Numerous boulder reefs were observed west of the river mouth within Freshwater Bay, whereas the sea-floor immediately adjacent to the river mouth was dominated by sand.
updated: 2008-05-07 pages include:

Publication
GIS Library, Multibeam Data, Massachusetts Bay, SBNM Sanctuary, USGS Data Series 99; Version 1.0; Start Page

Description: This Geographic Information Systems (GIS) library contains images and grids of bathymetry, shaded relief bathymetry, and backscatter intensity data from surveys of the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary and western Massachusetts Bay, offshore of Boston, Massachusetts. The data are in an Environmental Systems Research Institute (www.esri.com) (ESRI) ArcMap 9.1 Geographic Information System project. The shapefiles, images, and grids may also be downloaded individually. Descriptions and interpretations of the data are available in a series of published maps.
updated: 2008-03-06 pages include:

These are results 1 through 25 of 186 matches.

Coastal and Marine Geology Program > Online Science Resource Locator > Sonar Mapping