Multibeam echosounder (MBES) data recorded during RV MARIA S. MERIAN cruise MSM57/1 between 29.07.2016 and 12.08.2016 at Svalbard. The cruise investigated gas hydrate systems and their dynamics at the continental margin of Svalbard. The key instrument to be used during this expedition was the Bremen Deep Sea Drill Rig MeBo. Drilling during Leg 1 was concentrated mostly at the Vestnesa Ridge. CI Citation: Paul Wintersteller (seafloor-imaging@marum.de) as responsible party for bathymetry raw data ingest and approval. Description of data source: During the RV MARIA S. MERIAN cruise MSM57/1, the hull-mounted Kongsberg EM122 multibeam echosounder with a nominal sounding frequency of 12 kHz was utilized. 288 beams with an acoustical footprint of 2°(Tx)/2°(Rx) are formed for each ping. For further information consult https://www.km.kongsberg.com/. During this cruise the swath width was set to 120° to improve data quality, reduce the amount of noisy data at the outer beams and increase the ping rate. The use of the high-density equidistant and the dual-swath mode of the EM122 resulted in up to 864 soundings per ping. The EM122 was running continuously during the cruise with an average vessel speed of about 4.4 kn. Responsible person during this cruise / PI: P. Wintersteller (pwintersteller@marum.de). Chief Scientist: G. Bohrmann (gbohrmann@marum.de) CR: http://elib.suub.uni-bremen.de/edocs/00105895-1.pdf CSR: https://www2.bsh.de/aktdat/dod/fahrtergebnis/2016/20160045.htm A special thanks goes to the watchkeeper during MSM57/1: Chieh Wei Hsu, Michael Riedel