Abstract
In 2000, the authors published an article by Arveson and Vendittis [JASA 107, 118-129 (2000)] that described measurements of the radiated noise of a cargo ship measured by the U.S. Navy. Today, there are many, much larger ships in use; they inject more noise into the sea ambient, which may be causing increasing impacts on marine animals. This has led to an increasing interest in the noise from these ships. This report highlights several ship noise measurement challenges and how they may be mitigated by careful analysis and conformance to the recommendations in standards. [Additional definitions are provided in ISO/FDIS 18405 (2017).].
Highlights
There has been increasing interest in ship underwater noise in scientific communities, such as bioacoustics that are relatively new to this field, compared to those in the traditional naval communities.1,2 We are heartened by this trend, which has expanded greatly in this century
This report highlights several ship noise measurement challenges and how they may be mitigated by careful analysis and conformance to the recommendations in standards. [Additional definitions are provided in ISO/FDIS 18405 (2017).] VC 2022 Author(s)
It is always challenging to make accurate noise level measurements in underwater environments. This is especially true in measuring ship noise, which is inherently variable with time, aspect angles, wave height, propeller condition, draft, and machinery settings
Summary
There has been increasing interest in ship underwater noise in scientific communities, such as bioacoustics that are relatively new to this field, compared to those in the traditional naval communities. We are heartened by this trend, which has expanded greatly in this century. As seasoned specialists in this field, we believed that it might be helpful to remind newer researchers of some common pitfalls and how to mitigate them Neglect of these issues can cause significant errors, which may lead to faulty decisions in the application of ship noise data to future policies, protocols, and other matters. It is always challenging to make accurate noise level measurements in underwater environments This is especially true in measuring ship noise, which is inherently variable with time, aspect angles, wave height, propeller condition, draft, and machinery settings. In this real world context, a calibrated accuracy of 3 dB is a worthy goal, but note that for random noise, an uncertainty of 3 dB means we cannot distinguish whether there is one source or two equal sources. Measurements that quote dB levels with decimal point resolution (e.g., 0.5 dB) are unrealistic; this degree of accuracy may only be possible for reciprocity calibrations of transducers in a standards laboratory
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