February - April 2017: NOAA and partners conducted two telepresence-enabled ocean exploration cruises on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to collect critical baseline information of unknown and poorly known deepwater areas in American Samoa and Samoa, with an emphasis on Rose Atoll Marine National Monument, National Marine Sanctuary of American Samoa, and National Park of American Samoa.

April 2017: NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer conducted mapping operations 24 hours per day using the ship's state-of-the-art suite of sonars focused on mapping the seafloor, the water column, and the sub-seafloor. This is the second of two Okeanos cruises focused on exploring the waters of American Samoa and Samoa, and is the first of two cruises focused on exploring the waters of the Cook Islands.

April - May 2017: NOAA and partners conducted a telepresence-enabled expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to collect critical baseline information about deepwater areas as it transited across the northern portion of the Cook Islands, with focused work in the vicinity of both the Jarvis Island and Kingman/Palmyra units of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, prior to returning to Honolulu.

May - November 2017: The Ocean Exploration Trust conducted the third year of exploration in the Eastern Pacific Ocean on Exploration Vessel Nautilus, as scientists documented and surveyed unexplored regions from British Columbia, Canada, along the West Coast of the United States, and to Baja California, Mexico.

June 2017: A team of scientists aboard NOAA Ship Henry Bigelow spent 15 days at sea exploring canyon and slope habitats off the coast of the Northeast U.S. and Canada and sites in the Gulf of Maine with the Canadian remotely operated vehicle, ROPOS.

July - August 2017: NOAA and partners conducted an expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to continue collecting critical baseline information about unknown and poorly known deepwater areas in the Johnston Atoll Unit of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument.

August 2017: Operations during the expedition included focused mapping and strategic mapping transits by NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer within the waters of Hawaii and in international waters at the Musician Seamounts chain.

September 2017: NOAA and partners conducted an expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to explore unknown and poorly understood deepwater areas around the Musicians Seamounts and the Hawaiian Islands.

November 2017: NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer conducted an exploratory mapping expedition from Panama City, Panama, to Key West, Florida.

January - February 2017: This seafloor mapping expedition commenced on January 20, 2017, in Honolulu, Hawaii, and concluded on February 11 in Pago Pago, American Samoa.

March 2017: NOAA and partners conducted a telepresence-enabled ocean exploration expedition on NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer to collect critical baseline information about unknown and poorly known deepwater areas in the Howland and Baker Unit of the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument and the Phoenix Islands Protected Area.

April - July 2017: Following the expansion of the Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary in 2014, one of the prime research goals has been surveying newly included sanctuary areas for undiscovered shipwrecks. Over the course of a four-part expedition throughout the spring and summer of 2017, the sanctuary hosted a multifaceted, ongoing research project to apply new tools toward searching for these wrecks.

May 2017: Scientists explored sunken aircraft associated with the Battle of Midway, adding an important maritime heritage component to our understanding of the broader history of World War II in the Pacific. This year is the 75th anniversary of the battle, and this project aims to raise awareness and honor the legacy of the brave men who helped to turn the tide in the Pacific during the course of the Battle of Midway.

May 2017: Scientists on the IMMeRSS (Interagency Mission for Methane Research at Seafloor Seeps) expedition focused on the geology, ecology, chemistry, and physics of methane seeps on the U.S. Mid-Atlantic margin between Baltimore Canyon and Hatteras Canyon at water depths of 400-1,600 meters.

May - June 2017: The R/V F.G. Walton Smith circumnavigated Cuba, conducting daily remotely operated vehicle dives to focus on the mesophotic reef in order to discover and characterize the extent of mesophotic reefs in Cuba and to compare the health and connectivity (physical, genetic, and ecological) among the mesophotic and shallow coral reef systems in Cuba and the United States.

August 2017: NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science led an expedition aboard NOAA Ship Nancy Foster to map, survey, and sample deep-sea coral ecosystems in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the South Atlantic Bight.

September 2017: Scientists used a combination of mapping with water column profiling and sampling to improve knowledge of the geology along the U.S. continental margin, the types of communities found on the seafloor, and the mid-water communities that interact with those seafloor communities.

October - November 2017: The goal of this expedition was to provide the first glimpse of the deepwater communities within the largest and deepest UNESCO World Heritage Site on Earth, the Phoenix Islands Protected Area. This work was conducted during a 30-day cruise on the Schmidt Ocean Institute’s Research Vessel Falkor.

November - December 2017: A team of scientists and technicians, both at-sea and shore-based, conducted exploratory investigations into the diversity and distribution of deep-sea habitats and associated marine communities in the Gulf of Mexico basin.