Arafura Marine Park Backscatter Mosaics for Benthic Habitat Baseline

Two 32-bit geotiff backscatter mosaics were collected from the Arafura Marine Park aboard the RV Solander between 2–15 November 2020. The data provides baseline information on benthic habitats for Money Shoal and Pillar Bank, supporting a 10-year marine park management plan. A detailed post-survey report documents the collaborative project funded by the National Environmental Science Program Marine Biodiversity Hub.

Use Cases

• Mapping seabed hardness and texture for benthic habitat classification based on backscatter intensity.
• Establishing a pre-management baseline for environmental monitoring within the North Marine Park Network.
• Integrating with multibeam bathymetry, seabed samples, and underwater imagery for holistic seafloor characterization.

Strengths

• Data is tied to a specific, documented research survey (SOL7491/GA0366) with a published post-survey report.
• Collection used a specific multibeam system (EM2040C Dual Head) and processing software (CMST-GA MB Process v15.04.04.0).
• Project supports a defined 10-year management plan (2018-2028) for the North Marine Park Network.

Limitations

• Key metadata such as file size, row count, license, and author are consistently missing or listed as 'unknown' or 'None' across all platform entries.
• The dataset's spatial coverage is limited to two specific areas (Money Shoal and Pillar Bank) within the larger marine park.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia and the Australian Institute of Marine Science

Collection Method

Multibeam sonar survey from the RV Solander, processed with CMST-GA MB Process toolbox.

Time Range

2 – 15 November 2020

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-30 14:35:55.767546

Geography

Arafura Marine Park (Arafura Sea), specifically Money Shoal and Pillar Bank