Since World War Ⅱ, US nautical charts have shown seven "chemical munitions dumping areas" along the Pacific Coast between San Francisco and the Mexican border. However, little or no information is available about the amount, location, or nature of the materials that were dumped at most of these sites. At a recent meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, researchers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) describe a survey of one such deep-water dump site off Southern California. The preliminary survey turned up rubbish and 55-gallon drums, but no chemical munitions. A total of 32 chemical munitions dumping areas are shown on nautical charts of United States waters. Seven of these lie off the California coast, between San Francisco and the Mexican border. Some of the marked areas off California are huge, encompassing almost 4000 km~2 of seafloor. Of the seven California sites, only the area off San Francisco has been studied in any detail.
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