Discovery & Designation

Manta Ray and Monitor wreck.

In 1973 a team of scientists aboard Duke University Research Vessel Eastward located the shipwreck remains of what they believed to be the USS Monitor lying upside down in 230 feet of water approximately 16 miles off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. In 1974, they confirmed that the shipwreck was in fact the Monitor. During the expedition, scientists conducted extensive photography of the wreck from which the Naval Intelligence Division created the first photomosaic of the wreck. 

The shipwreck was designated the Monitor National Marine Sanctuary on January 30, 1975. The sanctuary is comprised of a column of water extending from the ocean’s surface to the seabed and is one nautical mile in diameter.