In 1842, Lieutenant Matthew Fontaine Maury, the father of naval oceanography, had a vision. The stacks of musty ship logs and records filling the recesses of his office at the Depot of Charts and Instruments offered an opportunity to unlock many of the oceans' mysteries. Determined to turn his obscure posting into something of significance, Maury began the scientific compilation of the seemingly countless observations of the sea and sky. After clear patterns emerged from his studies, he published a series of Wind and Current Charts, followed by his revolutionary book, Physical Geography of the Sea. Maury's publications became so popular with scientists and mariners around the world that by the mid-1850s he was arguably the most famous living naval officer. Commonly referred to as the "Pathfinder of the Seas," Maury had a talent for getting the ocean right, and created a timeless influence that continues to cast ripples across the oceans to which we look for recreation, commerce, and defense.
Maury's legacy as the "Father of Oceanography" has since been carried into battle by every warship in the U.S. Navy. The professional descendants of Maury produced the charts, celestial tables, and precise time needed to navigate the U.S. Navy to victory in two world wars. Since then, oceanography has evolved to characterize the marine environment in support of ever-increasingly complex military requirements. After 175 years, the Naval Oceanographic Office (NAVOCEANO) at Stennis Space Center, Mississippi, continues to adapt to the changing needs of maritime warriors in getting the ocean right by supplying relevant oceanographic knowledge across the full spectrum of warfare.1
Combat Hydrography Then and Now
Historically, Naval Oceanography's core mission has been surveying the sea floor for the safety of navigation. The resulting navigational products form the foundation for the oceanographic support of the major naval warfare disciplines. Seven forward-deployed multi-purpose survey ships provide the vanguard of the U.S. Navy's oceanographic data collection resources.2 Electronic transmission of data from the field to NAVOCEANO's Survey Operations Center allows the creation of near-real-time support for tactical navigation-a far cry from the early days of U.S. Navy charting when ships deployed for years at a time under wind and sail. The U.S. Exploring Expedition (1838-1842) sailed around the world under Lieutenant Charles Wilkes, charting the coastlines of the northwestern U.S. territories and many of the islands of the Central Pacific, as well as discovering Antarctica. A century later in World War II, U.S. forces stormed islands in the Pacific relying on these same charts. In response to the evolving needs of World War II amphibious warfare, Mobile Hydrographic Units charted anchorages, surveyed and cleared channels, and established aids to navigation. These surveyors made it possible for the logistical tail of reinforcements and cargo to be effectively fed into battle.
The modern counterpart to these combat hydrographers is the Fleet Survey Team (FST), which can respond rapidly to a wide variety of military and civil missions. During the December 2004 tsunami relief effort, the FST helped reestablish access to Sumatran ports and then less than a year later performed the same mission in its own backyard when Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Other small footprint assets such as autonomous underwater vehicles and airborne laser hydrography augment the ship-based survey systems as Naval Oceanography continues to support maritime warriors with precision navigational products.
In the 1950s, Naval Oceanography's mission expanded into the blue-water realm in response to the burgeoning Soviet submarine threat. When nuclear-powered submarines first probed under the Arctic ice cap and later circumnavigated the world while submerged, they did so with NAVOCEANO oceanographers on board. Oceanography has long been a hallmark of antisubmarine warfare (ASW), and it continues paving the way for the potential battles that have historically proved so costly to win. Honed by four decades of cat-and-mouse tactics in the Cold War, the exploitation of the ocean environment for ASW relies on the mastery of the scientific disciplines of acoustics, geology, and physical oceanography. In ASW the knowledge of the ocean battlespace is the proverbial high ground that allows warfighters to gain advantages in stealth, lethality, and tactics. Accurate characterizations of the depth and composition of the seafloor combined with the temperature and density of the water column feed the acoustic prediction models that define sonar performance. By combining ocean survey data with real-time data from satellites, drifting buoys, and ocean gliders, oceanographers validate models and refine products to provide a real-time tactical advantage in ASW.
This level of support does not happen with the sole infusion of science. A critical element of this support is a robust and flexible information technology architecture. Number crunching by the physics-intensive ocean models occurs on the Department of Defense's Major Shared Resource Center computers collocated with NAVOCEANO and ranked consistently among the top ten computing systems in the world.
Directed Application of Resources
In recent years, the Navy's oceanographic mission has expanded yet again, as Commander, Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command restructured its resources to directly support additional warfighting disciplines such as Naval Special Warfare. Oceanographic special warfare support focuses largely on supporting the war on terrorism by providing a broad array of specialized environmental products and support. Terrorists deliberately operate from isolated areas where they assume their local knowledge of a complicated environment provides them haven. Operational preparation for the environment in combating this threat is critical to minimizing risks and assuring mission success. This requires an accurate environmental understanding of the physical processes of the highly variable littoral and riverine environments. Oceanographers and imagery analysts work around the clock to provide products that describe the environment in terms of operational thresholds and mission objectives. The art of modem-day warfighting depends on having reliable knowledge of how environmental conditions will impact a mission. As the terrorism fight continues to push into remote littorals and rivers, accurate forecasts of meteorological and oceanographic conditions, bathymetry, beach profiles, and other critical environmental factors will remain vital to special warfare mission planning and execution.
Oceanography also plays an integral role in mitigating the mine threat to key ports and waterways, as all aspects of mine warfare are highly dependent on environmental conditions. Advances in bottom mapping, change detection, and oceanographic support have driven naval doctrine to evolve with respect to mine clearing and avoidance. Combining previously collected data with real-time observations in the field, specially trained Mobile Mine Warfare Teams provide advice to Fleet assets on the optimization of sensors and weapons systems based on environmental conditions such as tides, currents, water clarity, salinity, and geology. In an ironic twist of history, it was Matthew Maury himself who helped develop the first effective naval mines, used by the Confederate Navy in the Civil War. Fittingly it is his scientific legacy that is now helping to keep the world safe from this same threat. Heartened by their heritage, after 175 years, dedicated NAVOCEANO scientists continue to preserve Maury's proud legacy of getting the ocean right for the benefit of the U.S. Navy, the nation, and the world.
1. The office's lineage:
Depot of Charts and Instruments.................1830-1854
U.S. Naval Observatory and Hydrographic Offfce......................................1854-1866
U.S. Navy Hydrographic Office.....................1866-1962
U.S. Naval Oceanographic Office .................1962-1992
Naval Oceanographic Office.....................1992-Present
2. The ships are the: USNS John McDonnell (T-AGS-51), USNS Pathfinder (1-((GS-SO), USNS Sumner (T-AGS-61), USNS Bowditch (T-AGS-62), USNS Henson (T-AGS-63), USNS Bruce C. Heezen (T-AGS-64), and USNS Mary Sears (T-AGS-65).
Mr. Crew is the held of the Naval Oceanography Program Requirements Division et the Naval Meteorological and Oceanography Command. He is the author of the recently released book Combat Loaded: Across the Pacific on the USS Tate by Tens A&M Press.
Captain Brown teaches at the Naval War College. He is a former commanding officer of the Naval Oceanographic Office.