Acoustic noise interferometry in the Straits of Florida at 100 m depth: A mode-based interpretation

A field experiment designed to test the feasibility of noise interferometry was conducted in the Florida Straits in December 2012 in water of approximately 100 m depth. Ambient noise was recorded concurrently on three moored near-bottom instruments with horizontal separations of approximately 5 km, 10 km, and 15 km. Consistent with theoretical predictions, coherent sums (stacks) of many realizations of ambient noise at two measurement locations are shown to yield approximations to deterministic Green's functions that describe propagation between the two locations. Band-pass filtering of measured stacked cross-correlations reveal modal dispersion characteristics of the estimated Green's functions that are compared to mode-based simulations. [Work supported by NSF and ONR.]