[8] HURL has facilitated the long-term study of the Lo’ihi submarine volcano since 1987 and has analyzed its unique ecosystem and documented the growth of this new Hawaiian Island including investigation the collapse event in 1996.

[9] At the end of March in 2012, NOAA zeroed out all funding to HURL and closed down its National Undersea Research Center (NURC, formerly NURP).

Maritime Heritage and documentary dives contributed more needed financing, but it was evident that the University of Hawaiʻi would be unable to financially carry the program for any duration without more outside support.

[10] In June 2015, a proposed science expedition to China had emerged, allowing HURL to proceed with its required refit on the Pisces IV and the addition of more operations personnel.

However, after completing their series of test dives and within two days of their scheduled departure, the project was “put on hold” indefinitely due to “increased tensions in the South China Sea”.

[10] In the fall of 2016, new interest in the submersibles led to the first dives on Cook and McCall Seamounts and a return visit to the Lo’ihi Volcano funded by Conservation International.

This successful exploration was immediately followed by two expeditions funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to the Northwest Hawaiian Islands and Emperor Seamounts in 2016 and 2017 consisting of 24 and 53 coral survey dives.

The discovery kick-started a side program within the lab to continue the documenting the wreck sites of the various aircraft, ships, submarines, automobiles, and other miscellaneous remnants of Hawaiʻi's past that the submersibles encountered.

[15] On March 3, 2009 HURL began a series of dives off South Oʻahu under contract with the US Army to conduct an assessment of the chemical weapons disposed at sea after WWII.

[16] Although HURL has observed thousands of pieces of ordnance of numerous types over the past decades, the primary weapon of interest for this project was the M41A2 100-pound mustard gas bombs of which it is estimated that 16,000 were disposed of off Oahu.