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Pre 1920
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Coast Geodetic Survey
Nautical Charting
Bathymetry Mapping the Features
Pre-1920
Bathymetry Mapping the Features
Sounding machine devised by Robert Hooke.Drop glass ball with weight over side.Ball disengages when weight hits bottom.Known rate of descent and ascent - can then derive depth.Never worked right.
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HMS RACEHORSE in pack ice - Captain Constantine Phipps.Sounded in Norwegian Sea in 683 fathoms.Brought up blue mud.First modern successful sounding on continental slope area.Not sounding in image
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Boats from HMS EREBUS and HMS TERROR - Captain James Clark Ross.Sounded in open ocean at 27.43 S and 17.48 W.Recorded depth of approximately 2200 fathoms.First modern successful sounding in deep ocean
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USS VINCENNES in pack ice - Captain Charles Wilkes commanding.On the Antarctic shelf, Wilkes sounded with copper wire in 400 fathoms.First use of wire instead of hemp sounding line.Copper too ductile and would break - gave up on idea
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A second attempt at a bathymetric map by Matthew Fontaine Maury.Published in The Physical Geography of the Sea with black and grey shading.Showed vast relatively shoal area in Mid-Atlantic which gave birth to the notion of a Telegraphic Plateau. T
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Deepsea soundings by the USS ARCTIC - Otway Berryman commanding.Top line is ship track between Newfoundland and Ireland.Bottom line is profile and shows no plateau.Generated a controversy with Matthew Fontaine Maury.Maury declared erroneous and conti
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Sounding device made by William P. Trowbridge for Coast Survey.Line would pay out of a descending cylinder and stationery cylinder on deck.Similar to modern bathythermograph copper wire instrument.Civil War intervened stopping research.Probably would
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Thomson piano wire sounding machine as mounted on USS TUSCARORA.This machine was invented by Sir William Thomson, a.k.a. Lord Kelvin.Made use of heavy weight and piano wire - line paid out until weight hit bottom. This machine revolutionized deepse
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USS TUSCARORA - commanded by George Belknap.First ship to successfully use piano wire sounding machine
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Track of USS TUSCARORA from Cape Flattery to Japan.
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Profile with bottom characteristics of TUSCARORA soundings.Profile shows continental slope and Juan de Fuca Ridge.This was the first indication of the Juan de Fuca Ridge system
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Sounding record from Fish Commission Steamer ALBATROSS.
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The BLAKE anchored off WINDWARD Passage.George Belknap shipped Thomson piano wire machine to BLAKE in 1875Charles Sigsbee modified Thomson machine.Sigsbee sounding machine was the standard for many years
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Diagram of the Sigsbee Sounding Machine as used on the BLAKE.George Belknap shipped Thomson piano wire machine to BLAKE in 1875Charles Sigsbee modified Thomson machine to make the Sigsbee Sounding Machine. Sigsbee sounding machine was the standard fo
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Sigsbee Sounding Machine in use on the ALBATROSS.
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Contour map of Gulf of Mexico as sounded by the C&GS; Steamer BLAKEbetween 1873 and 1875. Over 3,000 soundings went into this chart, most of thedeep water soundings beween taken by the Sigsbee Sounding Machine. This was thefirst realistic bathymet
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Soundings from the Sigsbee Sounding Machine in the Gulf of Mexico.
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Contour map of the Caribbean from soundings by C&GS; Steamer BLAKE and FishCommission Steamer ALBATROSS. Both ships used Sigsbee Sounding Machine. In:Three Cruises fo the BLAKE by Alexander Agassiz, 1888. P. 98. Library CallNumber QH 93.A26 188
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3-D view of the Gulf of Mexico, Eastern U.S., and Western Atlantic.This is probably the first 3-dimensional seafloor view ever constructed. It waspublished in Three Cruises of the BLAKE, by Alexander Agassiz, 1888. P. 94.Library Call Number QH 93.
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Sigsbee Sounding Machine on stern of ALBATROSS.
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