Monostatic and bistatic measurements of targets resting on or buried under the seafloor

Measurements were conducted to investigate monostatic and bistatic scattering of targets resting on or buried under a seafloor. The measurements were performed in NSWC-PCD’s Facility 383, which is a 13.7 m deep, 110 m long, 80 m wide test pool with a 1.5 m layer of sand on the bottom. Two synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) rail systems were utilized in the measurements, and they were placed perpendicular to each other and oriented so as to look at the same region of the bottom. This strategy allowed a particular target and environment configuration to be set up and studied for both monostatic and bistatic geometries. Targets included a 0.61 m diam stainless steel shell and two 0.3 m diam solid aluminum cylinders with lengths of 0.61 and 1.52 m. This paper summarized the measurement setup and instrumentation. A sample of the results of these measurements will be presented. Subsequent papers will provide detailed analysis and comparisons with predictions of models. [Work supported by the Office of Naval Research and the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program.]