Occupying the region between the ocean surface and seafloor, the pelagic ecosystem contains the largest portion of the ocean’s biomass. The lack of observations in this region has resulted in limited understanding of ecosystem variability and dynamics. In July 2022, NOAA Ocean Exploration utilized the remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) Deep Discoverer and Seirios to conduct two water column dives over the Mid-Atlantic Ridge North of the Azores (MARNA) marine protected area and the Azores Plateau (AP), the first water column explorations for this region and some of the few dives that explore the benthic boundary layer. During these dives, horizontal transects were conducted at relatively consistent depths throughout the water column (~300-1800 m) and ROV video was annotated. Utilizing the annotations of the visible pelagic fauna to the lowest taxonomy level at first appearance for each transect, Shannon-Wiener biodiversity indices, species abundance, and species evenness were derived, providing critical insight on pelagic fauna inventory and behavior. These analyses showed no significant change in abundance between equivalent taxa at different transect depths; however, there was a significant difference in abundance between the two dive sites. Results suggested no significant difference between species richness of the two dive sites and biodiversity was not significantly different within the deep scattering layer. These insights allow for initial inferences about the variability of pelagic fauna in the vertical dimension from the mesopelagic to bathypelagic zone along with variability between the dive sites that can be compared with the results of future water column observations.