Captain Nicholas Hunter Heck (1 September 1882 – 21 December 1953) was a career officer of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey Corps.

After primary and secondary education at private schools in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Heck attended Lehigh University, from which he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1903 despite enduring an attack of typhoid fever.

Wire-drag surveying played a notable role in clearing unsurveyed channels in the waters of Alaska, discovered hundreds of obstructions elsewhere, and proved particularly useful to the United States during its participation in World War I.

[5] During the next few years, developments in the application of acoustics to depth sounding and navigation would afford him an opportunity to revolutionize hydrographic surveying techniques.

[7] With his acoustics experience in World War I, Heck, who by then was Chief of the Coast and Geodetic Survey's Division of Terrestrial Magnetism, was the obvious choice to lead this effort.

[7] Heck agreed, but believed that existing navigation aids would not meet the needs of the Coast and Geodetic Survey in terms of the immediacy and accuracy of position fixes.

[7][8] Heck oversaw tests at Coast and Geodetic Survey headquarters in Washington, D.C., that demonstrated that shipboard recording of the time of an explosion could be performed accurately enough for his concept to work.

[7] He worked with Dr. E. A. Eckhardt, a physicist, and M. Keiser, an electrical engineer, of the National Bureau of Standards to develop a hydrophone system that could automatically send a radio signal when it detected the sound of an underwater explosion.

[7] When Guide was commissioned in 1923, Heck had her based at New London, Connecticut, and arranged for her under his direction both to test her new echo sounder's ability to make accurate depth soundings and to conduct radio acoustic ranging experiments in cooperation with the U.S. Army Coast Artillery Corps.

[7] In late November 1923, with Heck aboard, Guide began a voyage via Puerto Rico and the Panama Canal to San Diego, California, where she would be based in the future, with her route planned to take her over a wide variety of ocean depths so that she could continue to test her echo sounder.

[7] Before she reached San Diego in December 1923, she had accumulated much data beneficial to the study of the movement of sound waves through water and measuring their velocity under varying conditions of salinity, density, and temperature.

[7] Under Heck's direction, Guide then conducted experiments off the coast of California during the early months of 1924 that demonstrated that accurate echo sounding was possible utilizing the new formulas.

Heck turned over continued development of echo sounding and radio acoustic ranging to Guide's commanding officer, Commander Robert Luce, and returned to his duties in Washington, D.C.[7] The first non-visual method of navigation in human history, and the first that could be used at any time of day or night and in any weather conditions, radio acoustic ranging was a major step forward in the development of modern navigation systems.

[9][10] Heck served as Chief of the Coast and Geodetic Survey's Division of Seismology and Terrestrial Magnetism[2] and was a leader in the development of geophysics,[2] a field in which he had a broad range of interests.

Heck's final position was Scientific Assistant to the Director of the Coast and Geodetic Survey,[1] who at the time was Rear Admiral Leo Otis Colbert.