Exploration of Wake Island's Deep Sea

As with most aspects of ocean exploration, the first step in searching for maritime heritage sites is mapping. For the areas around Wake Atoll involved in the Battle of Wake, we've used the Norbit WBMS multibeam sonar. The Norbit is a 400-kilohertz (kHz) compact, lightweight multibeam sonar that is depth-rated to 4500 m for mapping subsea data from a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) platform. By "mowing the lawn" back and forth with this sonar, the team can create very high-resolution terrain maps and potentially identify exploration features of interest for up-close ROV exploration that may not have been resolved on a lower-resolution map.

Spotted! E/V Nautilus off Wake Atoll as it explores a variety of mapping targets in search of maritime heritage sites from the Battle of Wake. Thanks to the air traffic control team on Wake for the unique perspective! 

Located 2,138 nautical miles west of Honolulu, Wake Atoll National Wildlife Refuge is the northernmost atoll in the Marshall Islands geological ridge and perhaps the oldest and northernmost living atoll in the world. The refuge includes 495,515 acres of submerged lands and waters surrounding Wake Atoll out to 12 nautical miles and is home to hundreds of species of coral, fish, birds, and more wildlife. The Refuge is part of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, cooperatively managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Department of the Air Force.