Marine Multibeam Backscatter Data from around the UK (2005 Onwards)
The British Geological Survey (BGS) holds an archive of multibeam backscatter data from BGS, the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) and other organisations. The data are stored within the National Geoscience Data Centre (NGDC) and the Marine Environmental Data and Information Network (MEDIN) Data Archive Centre (DAC) for Geology and Geophysics. The majority of the data were collected and processed for the Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) under the Civil Hydrography Programme (CHP). Backscatter image files (in GeoTIFF format) for a survey can be downloaded using the URL link provided or via the Deposited Data Search
https://webapps.bgs.ac.uk/services/ngdc/accessions/index.html?simpleText=backscatter&subjectList=3159#.
Backscatter data is useful for seabed characterisation for geological and habitat mapping. BGS works with the DAC for bathymetry data at the United Kingdom Hydrographic Office (UKHO) to archive the backscatter data. View and download the related bathymetry data via the ADMIRALTY Marine Data Portal
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/inspire-portal-and-medin-bathymetry-data-archive-centre.
Simple
- Date (Creation)
- 2005
Distributor
British Geological Survey
-
Enquiries
0115 936 3276
The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South
,
EDINBURGH
,
LOTHIAN
,
EH14 4AP
,
United Kingdom
0115 936 3142
0115 936 3276
Point of contact
British Geological Survey
-
Enquiries
0115 936 3276
The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South
,
EDINBURGH
,
LOTHIAN
,
EH14 4AP
,
United Kingdom
0115 936 3142
0115 936 3276
- Maintenance and update frequency
- notPlanned Not planned
- GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0
- BGS Thesaurus of Geosciences
-
- Bathymetry
- Sea floor
- UK Location (INSPIRE)
- Marine geology
- MEDIN
- dataCentre
- Keywords
-
- NERC_DDC
- Access constraints
- otherRestrictions Other restrictions
- Other constraints
- licenceOGL
- Use constraints
- otherRestrictions Other restrictions
- Other constraints
- The copyright of materials derived from the British Geological Survey's work is vested in the Natural Environment Research Council [NERC]. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a retrieval system of any nature, without the prior permission of the copyright holder, via the BGS Intellectual Property Rights Manager. Use by customers of information provided by the BGS, is at the customer's own risk. In view of the disparate sources of information at BGS's disposal, including such material donated to BGS, that BGS accepts in good faith as being accurate, the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) gives no warranty, expressed or implied, as to the quality or accuracy of the information supplied, or to the information's suitability for any use. NERC/BGS accepts no liability whatever in respect of loss, damage, injury or other occurence however caused.
- Other constraints
- Available under the Open Government Licence subject to the following acknowledgement accompanying the reproduced NERC materials "Contains NERC materials ©NERC [year]"
- Spatial representation type
- grid Grid
- Metadata language
- EnglishEnglish
- Topic category
-
- Geoscientific information
- Geographic identifier
-
BRISTOL CHANNEL [id=2001350]
- Date (Revision)
- 2010
- Geographic identifier
-
CELTIC SEA [id=2001353]
- Date (Revision)
- 2010
- Geographic identifier
-
ENGLISH CHANNEL [id=2001401]
- Date (Revision)
- 2010
- Geographic identifier
-
IRISH SEA [id=2001430]
- Date (Revision)
- 2010
- Geographic identifier
-
NORTH SEA [id=2001452]
- Date (Revision)
- 2010
- Geographic identifier
-
NORTHEAST ATLANTIC OCEAN (40W) [id=2001453]
- Date (Revision)
- 2010
- Geographic identifier
-
UK CONTINENTAL SHELF [id=121701]
- Date (Creation)
- 1979
N
S
E
W
))
- Begin date
- 2005
- End date
- 2005 After
- Unique resource identifier
- WGS 84 / UTM zone 30N (EPSG::32630)
- Unique resource identifier
- WGS 84 (EPSG::4326)
- Distribution format
-
-
Geotiff
()
-
Geotiff
()
Distributor
British Geological Survey
-
Enquiries
0115 936 3276
The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South
,
EDINBURGH
,
LOTHIAN
,
EH14 4AP
,
United Kingdom
0115 936 3142
0115 936 3276
- OnLine resource
- Offshore GeoIndex
- OnLine resource
- Offshore theme
- OnLine resource
-
Offshore (cultural data) theme
Offshore (cultural data) theme
- Hierarchy level
- dataset Dataset
- Other
- dataset
Conformance result
- Date (Publication)
- 2011
- Explanation
- See the referenced specification
- Pass
- No
Conformance result
- Date (Publication)
- 2010-12-08
- Explanation
- See http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2010:323:0011:0102:EN:PDF
- Pass
- No
- Statement
- For BGS multibeam surveys, processed backscatter data is created using CARIS software. BGS works with the partner Data Archive Centre (DAC) for bathymetry at the United Kingdom Hydrographic Office (UKHO) to obtain multibeam bathymetry data, mainly from the Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) Civil Hydrography Programme (CHP). The data often includes processed backscatter data which BGS make available, but if processed backscatter data are not included, in some cases BGS creates processed backscatter data from the raw data.
- File identifier
- c35db9dd-2a07-6c2d-e044-0003ba9b0d98 XML
- Metadata language
- EnglishEnglish
- Hierarchy level
- dataset Dataset
- Date stamp
- 2025-05-07
- Metadata standard name
- UK GEMINI
- Metadata standard version
- 2.3
Point of contact
British Geological Survey
The Lyell Centre, Research Avenue South
,
EDINBURGH
,
LOTHIAN
,
EH14 4AP
,
United Kingdom
+44 131 667 1000
- Dataset URI
- http://data.bgs.ac.uk/id/dataHolding/13605639
Overviews

Spatial extent
N
S
E
W
))
Provided by

Associated resources
Not available