Over 710,000 square kilometres of seafloor bathymetry data were collected from June 2014 to February 2017 to support the underwater search for missing flight MH370. Geoscience Australia provided expertise for the surveys, which used multibeam sonar mounted on multiple vessels. The dataset allows exploration of seafloor topography through an optimal resolution compilation of tiles overlain on a hillshade.
Use Cases
- Modeling underwater terrain for navigation based on detailed sea floor topography maps.
- Analyzing geological features in the Southern Indian Ocean based on bathymetric survey data.
- Supporting marine search and rescue planning based on high-resolution seafloor data.
- Studying deep-sea geomorphology based on hillshade visualizations of the sea floor.
Strengths
- Covers over 710,000 square kilometres of the Southern Indian Ocean.
- Data collection spanned nearly three years, from June 2014 to February 2017.
- Created from an optimal resolution compilation of bathymetric tiles.
Limitations
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
- Data may reflect geographic/temporal bias inherent to data_gov_au.
Provenance
- Source
- Geoscience Australia Data
- Collection Method
- Bathymetric data acquired by multibeam sonar mounted on the hull of multiple vessels.
- Time Range
- June 2014 to February 2017
- Freshness
- Last updated 2026-06-18 22:20:33.435846; freshness should be verified.
- Geography
- Southern Indian Ocean, specifically the MH370 search area and transit lines.