Considerations of Environmental Factors Affecting the Detection of Underwater Acoustic Signals in the Continental Regions of the East Coast Sea of Korea

This study considers the environmental factors affecting propagation loss and sonar performance in the continental regions of the East Coast Sea of Korea. Water mass distributions appear to change dramatically in a few weeks. Simple calculation with the case when the NKCW (North Korean Cold Water) develops shows that the difference in propagation loss may reach in the worst up to 10dB over range 5km. Another factor, an eddy, has typical dimensions of 100-200km in diameter and 150-200m in thickness. Employing a typical eddy and assuming frequency to be 100Hz, its effects on propagation loss appear to make lower the normal formation of convergence zones with which sonars are possible to detect long-range targets. The change of convergence zones may result in 10dB difference in received signals in a given depth. Thermal fronts also appear to be critical restrictions to operating sonars in shallow waters. Assuming frequency to be 200Hz, thermal fronts can make 10dB difference in propagation loss between with and without them over range 20km. An observation made in one site in the East Coast Sea of Korea reveals that internal waves may appear in near-inertial period and their spectra may exist in periods 2-17min. A simulation employing simple internal wave packets gives that they break convergence zones on the bottom, causing the performance degradation of FOM as much as 4dB in frequency 1kHz. An acoustic experiment, using fixed source and receiver at the same site, shows that the received signals fluctuate tremendously with time reaching up to 6.5dB in frequencies 1kHz or less. Ambient noises give negative effects directly on sonar performance. Measurements at some sites in the East Coast Sea of Korea suggest that the noise levels greatly fluctuate with time, for example noon and early morning, mainly due to ship traffics. The average difference in a day may reach 10dB in frequency 200Hz. Another experiment using an array of hydrophones gives that the spectrum levels of ambient noises are highly directional, their difference being as large as 10dB with vertical or horizontal angles. This fact strongly implies that we should obtain in-situ information of noise levels to estimate reasonable sonar performance. As one of non-stationary noise sources, an eel may give serious problems to sonar operation on or under the sea bottoms. Observed eel noises in a pier of water depth 14m appear to have duration time of about 0.4 seconds and frequency ranges of 0.2-2.8kHz. The 'song'of an eel increases ambient noise levels to average 2.16dB in the frequencies concerned, being large enough to degrade detection performance of the sonars on or below sediments. An experiment using hydrophones in water and sediment gives that sensitivity drops of 3-4dB are expected for the hydrophones laid in sediment at frequencies of 0.5-1.5kHz. The SNR difference between in water and in sediment, however, shows large fluctuations rather than stable patterns with the source-receiver ranges.