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“A bathymetric survey done with modern multibeam is more than just driving a ship around the ocean,” says Rear Admiral Shepard Smith, director of the United States Office of Coast Survey at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a contributor to Seabed 2030. “Sonar data is valuable, however; particularly in areas where we don’t have anything,” he says. “In the Pacific or the Arctic, for example, individual track lines can be quite helpful to better understand poorly mapped areas.”