Sanctuary Sounds - monitoring underwater sounds in the National Marine Sanctuaries Oceans 2005 MTS/IEEE

Although just in its initial stages of implementation the Sanctuary Sounds project has the potential to provide substantial data sets from the oceans for our nation. Fourteen sites within NOAA National Marine Sanctuary Program have been equipped with an Autonomous Underwater Listening Station (AULS). Each AULS has the capability of recording 58 hours of continuous sound at depth with each deployment. To date three sanctuaries have collected over 175 hours of sounds. Research partners from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of Massachusetts identify vocalizations produced by marine mammals, invertebrates and fish as well as anthropogenic sounds. This program will discuss the research and education/outreach applications gained from the deployment of the AULS and the myriad of uses for the data sets collected.