On August 6, 1997, representatives of the Monitor National Marine Sanctuary (MNMS), the Sanctuary and Reserves Division (SRD), the NOAA Diving Program (NDP), and the National Undersea Research Center at the University of North Carolina (NURC/UNCW) met in Washington, DC, to begin planning a diving expedition to the wreck of the Monitor the following year. The meeting was in response to a request from Mr. John Broadwater, Manager of the MNMS, to the NDP to conduct untethered, self-contained research dives to the wreck. Such a request was necessary due to the fact that the proposed diving operations were outside the scope of the NOAA Diving Regulations, thus requiring approval by the NOAA Diving Safety Board (NDSB).

A plan was devised to assemble a team of NOAA and NURC/UNCW personnel that would be trained in technical “trimix” diving techniques and prepared to carryout the underwater tasks assigned by Mr. Broadwater. One concern of the plan was the experience level of the dive team. Although the members of the dive team were all competent divers, they had limited experience in deep diving and virtually no experience diving on the Monitor. Mr. Broadwater indicated that a group of divers from the Cambrian Foundation (CF) had been diving at the Monitor for several years under a MNMS research permit and were extremely interested in participating in the expedition. He also indicated that the CF President, Mr. Terrence Tysall had volunteered to conduct technical trimix training for the NOAA and NURC/UNCW personnel at no charge. The merits of having a group of highly experienced deep divers with recent experience of diving on the Monitor was obvious and the plan was revised to include members of the Cambrian Foundation on the expedition. The combined team of NOAA, NURC/UNCW, and Cambrian Foundation was re-designated as the "Monitor Dive Team".