Multibeam Bathymetry and Backscatter Data: Northeastern Channel Islands Region, Southern California

The survey was directed and funded by the Minerals Management Service, which is interested in maps of hard bottom habitats, particularly natural outcrops, that support reef communities in areas affected by oil and gas activity.

The maps are also useful to biologists studying fish that use the platforms and the sea floor beneath them as habitat. The survey collected bathymetry and corrected, co-registered acoustic backscatter using a Kongsberg Simrad EM1002 multibeam echosounder that was mounted on the hull of the R/V Maurice Ewing. Three main regions were mapped during the survey including: (1) the Eastern Santa Barbara Channel adjacent to an area previously mapped with multibeam-sonar by the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (see the MBARI Santa Barbara Basin Multibeam Survey web page), (2) the Footprint area south of Anacapa Island, which has been studied extensively by rockfish biologists and is considered a good site for a marine protected area, and (3) part of the submarine canyons along the continental slope south of Port Hueneme.