210 



tion assistance. Satellites furnished by the 

 National Aeronautics and Space Administra- 

 tion (NASA) and the Navy, already in use 

 to establish the basic geodesy of the planet, 

 promise to have wider application. The 

 National Science Foundation and the Navy 

 share in the support of university ships. 



ESSA's Coast and Geodetic Survey is re- 

 sponsible for publishing the nautical charts, 

 sailing directions, and related navigational 

 publications. Coast Pilots, and tide and cur- 

 rent tables for U.S. waters. The Navy's 

 Oceanographic Office publishes a wide va- 

 riety of nautical charts, mostly for the world 

 oceans. The U.S. Army Corps of Engmeers 

 and its Lake Survey provide charts for the 

 Great Lakes and certain inland waters. 



The private sector also has many ships use- 

 ful for survey work and available for char- 

 ter. Contracting many of the survey tasks 

 to the private sector will facilitate rapid com- 

 pletion of the surveys and, perhaps more 

 important, will help build the industrial 

 capability required for further resource 

 delineation and exploitation. 



Basic Bathymetry and Geophysics 



Strategy for mapping involves difficult 

 choices for which there is no unequivocal 

 basis for decision, since one deals largely with 

 unknowns. To date, neither the Government 

 nor the private marine science community 

 has come to grips with the problem of civil 

 priorities. Divergent views have been ex- 

 pressed by the National Academy of Sciences 

 and the President's Science Advisory Com- 

 mittee on the importance of systematic sur- 

 veys. Consequently, a succession of proposed 

 mapping and survey programs have yielded 

 only sporadic and inadequate results. 



Ultimately, maps will be required to depict 

 all properties of the world's oceans which 

 may be of economic or scientific importance. 

 The Commission concludes that this require- 



To understand and use the oceans, 

 ice must first map them. Here 

 oceanographers aboard a university 

 research vessel examine a Coast and 

 Geodetic Survey chart in selecting 

 the xite for an offshore experiment. 



ment is sufficiently urgent to justify the im- 

 mediate beginning of a systematic general 

 ocean mapping program. The Commission's 

 proposals for deep ocean surveys were pre- 

 sented in the preceding chapter. This chapter 

 is concerned with the mapping of coastal 

 waters and the continental shelf. 



Mapping the bathymetry and the geophys- 

 ical characteristics of the continental shelves 

 and slopes is a top-priority task. The Com- 

 mission estimates that it could be accom- 

 plished over the next 10 years by seven 

 properly equipped and supported ships 

 devoted exclusively to the task and aug- 

 mented by a fully responsive vessel data 

 l^rocessing and map compilation system. Tlie 

 ships obtaining bathymetric data should 

 conduct concurrent gravimetric, magnetic, 

 and subbottom surveys, all keyed to the same 

 navigational control in order to carry out an 



