THE UWACS SYSTEM
Ultimate Sonar Assessment Systems, Inc. is currently developing the Underwater Acoustic Sentinel (UWACS), a sonar surveillance system, capable of automatically detecting and identifying underwater intruders from several hundred meters away.
In this post-911 period, the need to protect critical waterside assets such as port and harbor facilities, power plants, dams, bridges, offshore platforms and cruise ships is unprecedented. The UWACS system offers an effective solution to this extraordinary homeland security challenge.
The system features specialized, active acoustic sensors placed at strategic underwater locations. The sensors are networked together and cabled to a shore-side control station. The system is capable of automatically detecting and classifying physical objects, aquatic life and potential threats that enter the zone of surveillance. In the event a potential threat, such as a diver or surface swimmer is detected, the system is able to provide an alarm and the location of the threat for interdiction. A common problem in underwater threat detection is false alarms due to an inability of the system to classify detections. The UWACS system has unique target classification capabilities that minimize the occurrence of false alarms and offer a clear advantage when compared to other underwater threat detection systems.
RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT
The Underwater Acoustic Sentinel (UWACS) system is currently in the advanced stages of development. Research and development funding has been provided by the Department of Homeland Security, Sandia National Laboratories and the parent company of USA Systems, BioSonics, Inc. Numerous successful demonstrations and tests have been conducted with the prototype UWACS system using a variety of diver types. The first UWACS surveillance system installations are scheduled for 2008.
THE TECHNOLOGY
UWACS technology is based on the BioSonics DT-X digital scientific echosounder. DT-X technology is the latest in a long line of BioSonics active acoustic systems specifically designed to assess biological targets in shallow, complex environments. These systems are capable of determining the precise location of targets detected within the acoustic beam and are able to track target movement to assess direction of travel, velocity and behavior. This technology has been utilized extensively by government researchers and scientists to count and track aquatic species in a variety of complex marine environments for over twenty years. The acoustic transducer developed for this system features a very low side-lobe, focused beam design, to enable target detection at great ranges (500m +) with minimal interference from boundary reverberation. The acoustic signal is digitized within the transducer itself to further maximize signal-to-noise by reducing signal loss due to long analog cable runs. The resulting system has an extremely high dynamic range (> 160 dB) and a very low noise floor (-140 dB typical) allowing unsurpassed target detection in difficult environments. The system also features a unique “split-beam” transducer design which precisely measures differences in the phase angle arrival time in X and Y domains at the transducer face, allowing extremely accurate calculation of the location of the target within the acoustic beam. With this information, the absolute value of the target strength of the target can be calculated and the target’s behavior can be precisely assessed. The rich data produced from these systems allow an unprecedented ability to classify objects detected in the system’s surveillance region.
The UWACS underwater threat detection approach builds upon proven BioSonic, Inc. technology and provides a low cost, effective solution to underwater threat detection and classification. The system is flexible, modular and capable of interfacing with a variety of sensors and security systems, and features a high probability of threat detection with low false alarm rates.
