Southeast Tasmania Temperate Reef Survey with Multibeam and Video Data

The CERF Marine Biodiversity Hub survey of southeast Tasmanian temperate reefs was conducted in 2008 and 2009 aboard the RV Challenger. This report describes mapping and video characterization across seven sites, providing preliminary results from multibeam sonar, towed video, still photography, and Autonomous Underwater Vehicle deployments. The collaborative project involved the Tasmania Aquaculture and Fisheries Institute and Geoscience Australia.

Use Cases

• Classifying benthic communities based on underwater video and still photography characterizations.
• Mapping shallow-shelf temperate reef habitats using multibeam sonar data.
• Analyzing high-resolution reef photographs collected by an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV).

Strengths

• Survey conducted across seven distinct sites in southeast Tasmania.
• Data collection employed multiple complementary methods: multibeam sonar, towed video, still photography, and AUV.
• Collaborative project between a university institute (TAFI) and a national geoscience agency (GA).

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data may reflect geographic/temporal bias inherent to the specific 2008-2009 survey period.

Provenance

Source

Australian Ocean Data Network

Collection Method

Research survey aboard RV Challenger using multibeam sonar, towed video, still photography, and AUV.

Time Range

2008 and 2009

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-10 19:59:36.824578; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Southeast Tasmania, seven survey sites