Ocean Variability Effects on High‐Frequency Acoustic Propagation in KauaiEx Available to Purchase

During the Kauai experiment in summer of 2003 a bottom‐mounted vertical line array containing 8 hydrophones spaced 0.6 meter apart was deployed in a 100‐m shallow water region near the Pacific Missile Range Facility. The acoustic source was placed about 2 km away on a flat sea bottom at 95 meter water depth. The element spacing was sufficiently small to allow measurements of the temporal variability of time‐angle intensity fluctuations of the acoustic energy. Measurements were made simultaneously of the broadband acoustic pulse transmissions (8–50 kHz) and environmental parameters. The latter measurements included current, temperature and salinity profiles, directional surface wave spectra, as well as wind speed and direction above the sea surface. Arrival time‐angle fluctuations were found to be correlated with the environmental variability due to ocean dynamics in this region. It is shown that variations of the sea surface dynamics exhibit different temporal effects than those occurring within the water column.