The Globe and Mail has a short story on the efforts to map a portion of the Atlantic Ocean floor off the coast of New York, specifically, what is called the Husdon Canyon. Using a multi-beamed sonar system, staff with the USGS mapped a 160 kilometre by 100 kilometre portion of the seabed at a scale of 1:300,000. Two hefty pdfs of the maps (sheet 1 is 12 MB; sheet 2 is 30 MB) are available from the USGS for download. Sheet 1 contains a lengthy description of the methods and process used to map the area - also available on the project website.

Expect more of this to happen in the near future as land-based natural resources become increasingly exhausted.