Km. Stafford et al., Long-range acoustic detection and localization of blue whale calls in the northeast Pacific Ocean, J ACOUST SO, 104(6), 1998, pp. 3616-3625
Analysis of acoustic signals recorded from the U.S. Navy's SOund SUrveillan
ce System (SOSUS) was used to detect and locate blue whale (Balaenoptera mu
sculus) calls offshore in the northeast Pacific. The long, low-frequency co
mponents of these calls are characteristic of calls recorded in the presenc
e of blue whales elsewhere in the world. Mean values for frequency and time
characteristics from field-recorded blue whale calls were used to develop
a simple matched filter for detecting such calls in noisy time series. The
matched filter was applied to signals from three different SOSUS arrays off
the coast of the Pacific Northwest to detect and associate individual call
s from the same animal on the different arrays. A U.S. Navy maritime patrol
aircraft was directed to an area where blue whale calls had been detected
on SOSUS using these methods, and the presence of a vocalizing blue whale w
as confirmed at the site with field recordings from sonobuoys. [S0001-4966(
98)01312-5].