There are some 1000+ wrecks in Queensland waters and on the Great Barrier Reef. These range from wooden sailing ships to iron steam ships from the late 1700s to 1900s, having met their fate seeking passage through the perilous reef matrix. Other wrecks include planes and warships sunk due to Queensland’s role as an important base in World War II. Cyclones and other mishaps have caused the demise of many wrecks, or others deliberatly sunk as recreation scuba diving wrecks.

Here are some Queensland wrecks mapped using high-resolution multibeam sonar to generate detailed 3D point clouds, or use sidescan sonar to generate seafloor texture maps that highlight the hard sonar returns of the wrecks against the surrounding soft sediments. Diver-collected underwater photos can also be stitched together with photogrammetry software to reveal photo-realistic mosaics of wrecks.