"The Northern San Andreas Fault (NSAF) stretches from the Mendocino Triple Junction, an area in northern California where three tectonic plates meet, south through the San Francisco Bay area. The NSAF ruptured over 100 years ago in the great San Francisco earthquake of 1906. The rupture was thought to have caused rifts and scarps in the seafloor, but in the time that has passed since the earthquake, the underwater portion of the fault has remained largely unexplored until this past September when the expedition team completed a multidisciplinary investigation of the fault offshore of northern California. The expedition utilized two vessels, the Sailing Research Vessel Derek M. Baylis and the Research Vessel Pacific Stormas well as the SeaBED AUV Lucille from NOAA Fisheries Northwest and Pacific Fisheries Science Centers. Multibeam mapping operations and seismic profiling were conducted onboard the Baylis while AUV and fisheries sonar operations were conducted onboard the Pacific Storm"--Introduction.

Ocean Exploration Program
Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR)