ASA 129th Meeting - Washington, DC - 1995 May 30 .. Jun 06

2pUW27. Three-dimensional acoustic/geoacoustic propagation modeling of the New Jersey Atlantic generating station site.

Ocean Acoust. Prog., Office of Naval Res., Arlington, VA 22217

George Botseas

Ding Lee

Naval Undersea Warfare Ctr., New London, CT 06320

William L. Siegmann

Rensselaer Polytechnic Inst., Troy, NY 12180

Propagation effects of 3-D geological features in shallow water sediment layers at the Atlantic generating station (AGS) continental shelf site are investigated. Profiles of compressional and shear sound speed, attenuation, and density have been generated from 23 available geological cores at the AGS site and discussed in connection with a recent acoustic experiment conducted there [Badiey et al., 3593--3604 (1994)]. A 3-D geoacoustic data set is constructed from these profiles using interpolation schemes based on Akima splines and on krieging. Correlation properties of the sound speeds and density fields clearly show the existence of sublayer geological features. The geoacoustic fields, along with detailed bathymetry and water sound speed, are used for input a 3-D frequency domain PE propagation model. Both 3-D and Nx2-D simulations are performed over a circular region corresponding to the experimental configuration. Relative influences of sediment sound-speed structure and water--sediment interface topography on transmission loss are determined for frequencies up to 1 kHz. Simulation results are compared with spectra obtained from the broadband experimental transmission loss.