Toward a Better Understanding of Man-Made Acoustics Sources and Whales

Columbia University, New York NY

Investigators

Abstract

0317888 Tolstoy This award to Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory (LDEO) of Columbia University in the City of New York provides support for participation of LDEO researchers in the multi-agency Sperm Whale Seismic Study (SWSS), an investigation of behavioral response of endangered sperm whales to anthropogenic sound. LDEO plans to participate in the 2003 field season operations in the Gulf of Mexico, providing the R/V Ewing as a research platform for interdisciplinary research, and conducting an investigation of acoustic source and transmission properties of the R/V Ewing airgun arrays and other acoustic sources on the vessel. The present award will cover costs to modify an existing spar buoy as an acoustic receiver for the field program in Gulf of Mexico, as well as participation in the experiment. It will also support a postdoctoral researcher to analyze and model data from the Ewing array, and it will support a study of acoustic propagation from a R/V Ewing cruise in the Gulf of California in fall 2002. ***