Fusion of acoustic measurements with video surveillance for estuarine threat detection

Stevens Institute of Technology has established a research laboratory environment in support of the U.S. Navy in the area of Anti-Terrorism and Force Protection. Called the Maritime Security Laboratory, or MSL, it provides the capabilities of experimental research to enable development of novel methods of threat detection in the realistic environment of the Hudson River Estuary. In MSL, this is done through a multi-modal interdisciplinary approach. In this paper, underwater acoustic measurements and video surveillance are combined. Stevens' researchers have developed a specialized prototype video system to identify, video-capture, and map surface ships in a sector of the estuary. The combination of acoustic noise with video data for different kinds of ships in Hudson River enabled estimation of sound attenuation in a wide frequency band. Also, it enabled the collection of a noise library of various ships that can be used for ship classification by passive acoustic methods. Acoustics and video can be used to determine a ship's position. This knowledge can be used for ship noise suppression in hydrophone arrays in underwater threat detection. Preliminary experimental results of position determination are presented in the paper.