Type locality.—200 m depth off the north coast of Grand Bahama Island, Bahamas.
Range.—Bahamian deep water endemic.
Discussion.—Oliva bahamasensis is similar to O. drangai Schwengel, 1951, and O. harhadensis Petuch & Sargent, 1986, two other deep-water olives from the eastern Caribbean. The Bahamian species is noticeably more inflated and stockier, has only very weak columellar plications, and characteristically has a bright yellow color. This record can be regarded as a minor range extension; pushing the range from the northern slopes of the Little Bahama Bank into the deep waters of the Florida Straits and south along the shelf of the Great Bahama Bank throughout the Bimini Chain of Islands. Oliva bahamasensis is one of the deepest dwelling olives in the entire western Atlantic.
Dredged specimen figured herein, matches the original description by Petuch & Sargent (1986), with little if any variation. The shell is solid and thick with an overall fusiform shape and the protoconch large. The edge of the suture is marked with purple-red flammules that run onto the shoulder. The interior of the aperture of the Bimini specimen is white instead of pale-yellow orange and the columellar area has 15 thin, weak plications, with the anterior four being the strongest.