This document provides an assessment of ecological condition, with an emphasis on soft-bottom habitats and overlying waters, along the U.S. continental shelf in the northeastern Gulf of Mexico, from Anclote Key on the west coast of Florida to the Mississippi River Delta. Sampling was conducted in August 2010, approximately one month after the Deepwater Horizon Wellhead was capped. The project was a collaborative effort by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)/National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS), the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and Texas A&M University (TAMU). This project is part of a series of studies, similar in protocol and design to EPA's Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program (EMAP) and subsequent National Coastal Assessment (NCA), which extend these prior efforts in estuaries and inland waters out to the coastal shelf, from navigable depths along the shoreline seaward to the shelf break (approximate 100 m depth contour).