USNS Marie Tharp (T-AGS-66)[1] is a Pathfinder-class oceanographic survey ship operated by the Military Sealift Command of the United States Navy.

The-then Maury's keel was laid on 1 February 2011 in a ceremony at the VT Halter Marine shipyard in Moss Point, Mississippi.

[3] The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020 created a new Naming Commission to examine names across the US armed forces that honor the Confederate States of America, the group of states that attempted to break away from the US during the American Civil War.

[8] Maury was named after military officer and diplomatic envoy Matthew Fontaine Maury, the "Father of Modern Oceanography" who resigned from a 36-year career in the US Navy to accept a command in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War.

[9][10][11] On 8 March 2023, International Women's Day, the US Navy Secretary, Carlos Del Toro, announced the ship would be renamed in honor of oceanographer Marie Tharp, best known for helping produce the first scientific map of the Atlantic Ocean floor.