They include an extensive area of 11.7 million sq km - an area that extends past the continental shelf and to depths of 11,000m.Dr Helen Neil, Niwa geologist, If you have ever wondered what the sea floor of coastal Wairarapa really looked like you can now satisfy your curiosity
without spending a cent.
Detailed maps of the seabed around New Zealand are now available on the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (Niwa) website, in high resolution, showing the once hidden seabed of the deep sea in fine digital detail.
Niwa scientists describe the maps as a treasure for all New Zealanders, giving an unprecedented insight into the varying shape of the ocean floor, ridges, volcanoes, plateaus, canyons and seamounts.
Marine database manager Kevin Mackay said the maps would benefit anyone connected with the sea, including fishermen, those involved with environmental management, conservation, hazard mitigation and energy and mineral exploration.
But Mr Mackay said any thoughts that the maps could help find shipwrecks or sunken treasure could be quickly dispelled.
He said when vessels go down they normally break up quickly and within weeks are cloaked in sand and sediment.
Finding wrecks using echosounders was no easy business either, as hulls sounded much the same as rock formations and it was difficult to "sort the wheat from the chaff".
Niwa geologist Dr Helen Neil said the Niwa seabed maps were "the best product around". "They include an extensive area of 11.7 million sq km - an area that extends past the continental shelf and to depths of 11,000m."
Seafloor mapping records date back to early Maori and European explorers. One of the first maps drawn was by an old Maori chief named Toiawa, on the deck of the Endeavour in 1769.
Captain Cook gauged water depth by lowering a weighted, adjustable rope to the seabed, a technique used in ancient Egypt.
Systematic recording of ocean depths began in coastal waters with settlement in the country but charts of the southwest Pacific Ocean did not appear until about 1895, 20 years after the first worldwide ocean survey.
Accuracy and speed of surveying was enhanced greatly by the invention of the echosounder in 1912.
New technologies continue to uncover the murky face of the sea floor.
To download the Niwa maps on your computer, go to:
http://www.niwa.co.nz/our-science/oceans/bathymetry
They include an extensive area of 11.7 million sq km - an area that extends past the continental shelf and to depths of 11,000m.Dr Helen Neil, Niwa geologist, If you have ever wondered what the sea floor of coastal Wairarapa really looked like you can now satisfy your curiosity
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