Mono-hydrophone localization of baleen whales: a study of propagation using a spectral element method applied in Northern Chile

• Published in: OCEANS 2019 - Marseille
• Main Authors: Patris, Julie, Komatitsch, Dimitri, Sepúlveda, Maritza, Santos, Macarena, Glotin, Hervé, Malige, Franck, Buchan, Susannah, Asch, Mark
• Other Authors: DYNamiques de l’Information (DYNI), Laboratoire d'Informatique et des Systèmes (LIS) (Marseille, Toulon) (LIS), Aix Marseille Université (AMU)-Université de Toulon (UTLN)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Aix Marseille Université (AMU)-Université de Toulon (UTLN)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Ondes et Imagerie (O&I), Laboratoire de Mécanique et d'Acoustique Marseille (LMA ), Aix Marseille Université (AMU)-École Centrale de Marseille (ECM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Aix Marseille Université (AMU)-École Centrale de Marseille (ECM)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Universidad de Concepción - University of Concepcion Chile, Laboratoire Amiénois de Mathématique Fondamentale et Appliquée (LAMFA), Université de Picardie Jules Verne (UPJV)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), PNRIA, ANR-18-CE40-0014,SMILES,Modélisation et Inférence Statistique pour l'Apprentissage non-supervisé à partir de Données Massives(2018)
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2019
• Subjects: acoustic propagation; underwater acoustics; source localization; bioacoustics; [PHYS.MECA.ACOU]Physics [physics]/Mechanics [physics]/Acoustics [physics.class-ph]; Balaenoptera musculus; baleen whales
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-02440437; https://hal.science/hal-02440437/document; https://hal.science/hal-02440437/file/Patris.pdf; https://doi.org/10.1109/OCEANSE.2019.8867333

International audience In the context of passive acoustic monitoring of large whales, we propose a new method for localizing blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) from the acoustic recordings of only one sensor. We use a precise modelling of the sound propagation thanks to SPECFEM, a spectral element code for solving wave propagation equations. Based on field measurements in Northern Chile, we ran a simulation on a large supercomputer. We also exploited a recording device, Bombyx II, for one and a half months, with visual monitoring of the zone by a group of experts. We find that the method applied to the south east Pacific song of blue whales gives theoretical results of about 50% success in position recovery. Since we have redundancy in our data, we were able to locate the whale with a precision of 500 m over a box of 10 km by 5 km in the case when we have both visual detection and a strong acoustic signal. More tests should be performed before validating this method, but these first results are encouraging.