The Gulf of Mexico Passive Acoustic Monitoring Program collaborative research project aims to document and describe soundscapes in the northern Gulf of Mexico (GoMex) region. The overarching objective of this project is to design and implement a passive acoustic monitoring program using a variety of data collection platforms including stationary and mobile instruments.

The collection and analysis of passive acoustic data supports research into the soundscape of marine environments. Primary uses include detecting and characterizing sounds produced and used by living marine resources, natural sources of noise from physical oceanographic processes, and anthropogenic noise sources that contribute to the overall ocean noise environment. This analysis supports a wide range of activities including marine mammal stock assessments, monitoring of earthquake and geological activity, and assessing impacts of anthropogenic noise on marine life. The goal of this collection is to steward an accessible national archive of passive acoustic data available to researchers and the public, and to assist NOAA in meeting their data management and accessibility requirements.

This record represents the raw passive acoustic data collected by NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) and the Alfred Wegener Institute using Autonomous Hydrophones deployed in the Fram Straight.

This record represents the raw passive acoustic data collected by NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) and the Alfred Wegener Institute using Autonomous Hydrophones deployed in the Fram Straight.

To understand natural and anthropogenic sound in the ocean, and to compare underwater soundscapes globally, standard methods of analysis must be applied to passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) data. Methods that balance constrained volume and adequate resolution of acoustic spectra have recently been published (Martin et al., 2021a,b). A community effort supported by NOAA, BOEM, U.S. Navy, and ONR was initiated to apply these methods to PAM datasets from around the world. These records are hybrid millidecade (HMD) spectra of sound levels derived from calibrated passive acoustic data. Daily HMD at 1 minute resolution were created using standalone MANTA software (v9.6.11).

To understand natural and anthropogenic sound in the ocean, and to compare underwater soundscapes globally, standard methods of analysis must be applied to passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) data. Methods that balance constrained volume and adequate resolution of acoustic spectra have recently been published (Martin et al., 2021a,b). A community effort supported by NOAA, BOEM, U.S. Navy, and ONR was initiated to apply these methods to PAM datasets from around the world. These data are hybrid millidecade (HMD) spectra of sound levels derived from calibrated passive acoustic data. Daily HMD at 1 minute resolution were created using standalone MANTA software (v9.6.13) from audio data recorded by the SanctSound monitoring project at various sites.

To understand natural and anthropogenic sound in the ocean, and to compare underwater soundscapes globally, standard methods of analysis must be applied to passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) data. Methods that balance constrained volume and adequate resolution of acoustic spectra have recently been published (Martin et al., 2021a,b). These records are the results of this standardized analysis of PAM data, specifically calculation of hybrid millidecade (HMD) sound pressure levels derived from calibrated passive acoustic data from a long-term monitoring effort in the U.S. national marine sanctuary system. Daily HMD at 1 minute resolution were created using PyPAM software v0.2.0.

This record represents the raw passive acoustic data collected from the NOAA-Navy Sanctuary Soundscapes Monitoring Project (SanctSound). NOAA and the U.S. Navy are working to better understand underwater sound within the U.S. National Marine Sanctuary System. From 2018 to 2021, these agencies collected passive acoustic data to study sound at 30 recording sites within seven national marine sanctuaries and one marine national monument, which includes waters off Hawai'i and the east and west coasts.

Theis collection contains raw audio data collected during the Passive Acoustics Survey of Cetacean Abundance Levels (PASCAL) in 2016.

The project collected three years of baseline data 12 - 60 km offshore of Maryland prior to construction and operation of an offshore wind energy facility. Two main types of sound recording devices that encompassed a range of frequencies were used to detect vocalizations from baleen whales (low frequencies) and toothed whales (high frequencies): the Marine Autonomous Recording Unit (MARU, or pop-up) sampling at 2 kHz and the C-POD (cetacean click detector), which monitors the 20 - 160 kHz frequency range. These were supplemented by additional acoustic recorders during select periods of the study at five sites to provide further information on mid-frequency sounds, such as dolphin whistling behavior. The use of a grid array design for the acoustic detection devices within the Maryland WEA facilitated localization of vocalizing whales to further understand spatial patterns of habitat usage. RESULTS: There is substantial overlap between marine mammals and the Maryland WEA, but this varies seasonally. While the risk to endangered whales is lowest during the summer, the risk to bottlenose dolphins may be highest at this time, as they are most abundant in the summer time. The year-round occurrence of marine mammals offshore of Maryland will require decision-makers to consider the trade-off of the potential impacts