Southeast Tasmanian Shelf Reef Bathymetry and Habitats from 2008-2009 Sonar

A flythrough video showing bathymetry of the southeast Tasmanian shelf, derived from multibeam sonar collected in 2008 and 2009. The data highlights rock reef habitats, including low-relief reefs on the Freycinet and Tasman Peninsulas and high-relief reefs around Hippolyte Rocks. The work was a collaboration between Geoscience Australia and the University of Tasmania's Institute for Marine & Antarctic Studies, funded under the Commonwealth Environment Research Facilities programme.

Use Cases

• Visualizing seafloor topography and reef structures based on the 3-4 m resolution bathymetric grid.
• Identifying hard substrate locations for kelp and sponge communities based on the described reef features.
• Comparing geomorphological features like low-relief (<5 m) and high-relief (50-90 m) reefs across the shelf.
• Supporting marine spatial planning for the southeast Tasmanian shelf based on the habitat mapping.

Strengths

• Bathymetric data derived from multibeam sonar using a 300 kHz Simrad EM3002 system.
• Data gridded at a 3-4 meter resolution, suggesting a detailed spatial scale.
• Specific geomorphic features are identified, including low-relief (<5 m) and high-relief (50-90 m) reefs.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The primary data format is a video (VIDEO/X-FLV), which may limit quantitative analysis without the underlying raster data.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia and University of Tasmania (Institute for Marine & Antarctic Studies), via the Australian Ocean Data Network.

Collection Method

Multibeam sonar surveys conducted from RV Challenger.

Time Range

2008, 2009

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-10 17:02:32.656352; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Shelf along the coast of southeast Tasmania, including Freycinet Peninsula, Tasman Peninsula, Hippolyte Rocks, The Friars south of Bruny Island.