Transmission of side-scan sonar snippets from an underway unmanned underwater vehicle

Abstract

An unique vector quantization compression methodology was applied to compress and encode side-scan sonar snippets of mine-like objects generated by automated target recognition tools on-board underway unmanned underwater vehicles (UUV). These compressed and encoded images were then further formed into acoustic packets. The objective was to transmit these acoustic packets, underwater, as representations of the sonar snippets (mugshots). The ability to transmit sonar snippets underwater while the UUV is underway is important as it allows the above-water operator to examine an image of mine-like objects, without recovering the UUV, for a timely decision on whether the object is actually a mine. This vector quantization method was used because of its terseness and thus it could be transmitted by WHOI underwater micromodems integrated on IVER3 UUVs. This presentation describes the algorithm, its implementation, and its initial in-water validation in local waters. This capability was also validated and demonstr...