Benthic images recorded by a Remotely Operated Vehicle stills camera during cruise JC241 in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone (Pacific Ocean, 2023).

A collection of benthic still images was obtained using a downward-looking camera mounted on the UK ISIS Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV), deployed from the RRS James Cook during cruise JC241 in the abyssal plain (~4700 m depth) of the Clarion-Clipperton Zone, Pacific Ocean, in 2023. The Grasshopper2 GS2-GE-50S5C camera on the ROV collected vertically orientated still images at a target altitude of 2.5 m above the seabed, of which 16435 were suitable to assess benthic biological patterns around an area disturbed by a deep-sea mining machine in 1979. The mining machine (9 m wide, 14 m long, 4.5 m high) was operated by the Ocean Minerals Company (OMCO) from the ship Hughes Glomar Explorer on the seafloor between 15 and 18 March 1979 at a site centred 13°44'N 126°13.5'W. The images show the seabed covered by polymetallic nodules and the disturbance caused by the past mining activities. Images were collected within the Collection Tracks, in an adjacent area expected to have been impacted by a sediment plume (Plume Area), and a Control Area around 2 km away. The data were collected by scientists from the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, UK as part of the NERC-funded Seabed Mining And Resilience To EXperimental impact (SMARTEX) project (NE/T003537/1).