The Identification of Potentially Hazardous Material Discovered In and Around the Mesoamerican Reef Region of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula

In 2007 an underwater survey of the coral reef system off Bahia de la Ascension (Punta Allen, Mexico) discovered 26 anomalies among the reef, ranging from “man-made geometric patterns” to “unusual shadows” to “unusual bottom disturbances” to “possible debris fields.” It is the search for and the analysis of the impact of these 26 anomalies that is the subject of this report. A Maritime Education and Research Society (MERS) Diving Team, supported by the Mexican Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Subdirección de Arqueología Subacuática (INAH) and the Sian Ka'an Biosphere Reserve re-visited the area nine years later to inspect these 26 sites to ensure that the reef system remained healthy despite the findings of such anomalies, many of which were clearly man-made and resting on the reef.