Oceanographic data collected during the HB1204 (Deep-Sea Corals and Benthic Habitats in Northeast Deepwater Canyons) expedition on the NOAA Ship Henry Bigelow in the North Atlantic Ocean between July 3, 2012 - July 18, 2012 (NODC Accession 0097966)

A multi-disciplinary team of scientists on the Henry Bigelow HB1204 mission surveyed and ground-truthed known or suspected deep-sea coral habitats associated with deepwater canyons off the coast of the northeastern U.S. using the state-of-the-art ME70 multibeam survey system. This project's scientific objectives include: surveying the canyon area and inter-canyon slope habitats with a towed camera to characterize benthic habitats and identify areas of coral presence; ground-truthing areas predicted to be coral hotspots by habitat suitability models; ground-truthing recently collected multibeam data; ground-truthing historical coral records; conducting multibeam mapping in areas where data are missing or incomplete; assembling a database of photographs, species identification, and species abundances/distribution statistics; assembling maps of geo-referenced coral locations and associated data; providing research opportunities for teachers and professional researchers; collecting, sorting, identifying, and curating whole specimens and tissue collections for future analysis.