Skip to content

Return to Midway

NOAAS Okeanos Explorer
NOAAS Okeanos Explorer

In early March, the SeaWord Foundation will plan to participate in a NOAA expedition to survey the Northwest Hawaiian Islands marine preserve that will include a return to the site of the Battle of Midway.  This will advance the prospects of making a historic discovery of the aircraft carriers of the Imperial Japanese fleet that were lost there on June 4, 1942, and in partnership with IMMF will serve to commemorate the brave sailors and airmen who fought there.  This cooperative venture will use the latest tools and techniques to map the area and investigate underwater contacts, and our participation is made possible by a concept called telepresence.  The NOAA vessel Okeanos Explorer will be working in the Pacific area early in 2016; using instant global communication links, data will be relayed to exploration command centers (ECC) located in Rhode Island and Maryland.  We will interact with the ship from these locations to manage the survey and see the images relayed from the ocean floor in near real time.

SeaWord’s Education team will man the Silver Spring, Maryland ECC and is working on a plan to share this expedition with educators and the general public both through real-time web links and post-mission content. Check this space for more information in the coming weeks.