Development of a model to assess masking potential for marine mammals by the use of air guns in Antarctic waters

• Main Authors: Wittekind, Dietrich, Tougaard, Jakob, Stilz, Peter, Dähne, Michael, Clark, Christopher W., Lucke, K., von Benda-Beckmann, Sander, Ainslie, Michael A., Siebert, Ursula
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: Springer 2016
• Subjects: Mysticetes; Pinnipeds; Propagation modeling; Seismic; Antarctic; Southern Ocean; Antarc*
• Online Access: https://research.wur.nl/en/publications/development-of-a-model-to-assess-masking-potential-for-marine-mam; https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-2981-8_156

We estimated the long-range effects of air gun array noise on marine mammal communication ranges in the Southern Ocean. Air gun impulses are subject to significant distortion during propagation, potentially resulting in a quasi- continuous sound. Propagation modeling to estimate the received waveform was conducted. A leaky integrator was used as a hearing model to assess communication masking in three species due to intermittent/continuous air gun sounds. Air gun noise is most probably changing from impulse to continuous noise between 1,000 and 2,000 km from the source, leading to a reduced communication range for, e.g., blue and fin whales up to 2,000 km from the source.