Chirp Sub-Bottom Profile Geophysical Data Collected in 2024 From Wallops Island and Assawoman Island, Virginia

As part of the Interconnected Coastal Environments at Decadal Timescales and Coastal Sediment Availability and Flux projects, scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center conducted a nearshore geophysical survey to map the shoreface and characterize stratigraphy near Wallops and Assawoman Islands, Virginia (VA). The purpose of this study was to collect bathymetry to initialize hydrodynamic models and acquire new sub-bottom profile data to connect with existing USGS offshore lines collected along the Delmarva Peninsula, Maryland and VA, in 2015 (Sweeney and others, 2015). These newly acquired datasets will be used to help evaluate impacts of shoreface engineering activities on system ecogeomorphology. Collecting geophysical data can help researchers identify relationships between the geologic history of the islands, their present-day morphology, and sediment distribution.

This data release serves as an archive of sub-bottom profile and navigation data collected June 2024, offshore of Wallops and Assawoman Islands, VA during USGS Field Activity Number 2024-310-FA. Data products, including chirp sub-bottom profile data and images, survey trackline map, location data with formal Federal Geographic Data Committee metadata, and field logs are provided. Coastal bathymetry and topographic data were also collected during this geophysical survey and will be provided in another data release.

Sweeney, E.M., Pendleton, E.A., Ackerman, S.D., Andrews, B.D., Baldwin, W.E., Danforth, W.W., Foster, D.S., Thieler, E.R., and Brothers, L.L., 2015, High-resolution geophysical data collected along the Delmarva Peninsula 2015, U.S. Geological Survey Field Activity 2015-001-FA (ver. 3.0, May 2016): U.S. Geological Survey data release, https://doi.org/10.5066/F7P55KK3.