Reporting Impulsive Noise from Underwater Explosions Using Seismic Data

The clearance of mines and other unexploded ordnance is known to pose the utmost danger to marine life, causing injuries and even mortality (Lewis, Effects of underwater explosions on life in the sea. Defence Science and Technology Organization, Canberra, 1996). The EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive requires the spatial distribution, temporal extent of noise levels produced by the explosions do not exceed levels that adversely affect populations of marine animals. For achieving this aim, the data about the explosions have to be collected and reported to the impulsive noise registries, as is the ICES impulsive noise register (ICES, Impulsive noise events registry in support of OSPAR and HELCOM, ICES, 2022). Reporting impulsive noise data can be quite challenging, as data collection methods vary by country and are subject to local legislative restrictions (Merchant et al., Mar Pollut Bull 152:110951, 2020). One way to facilitate reporting is to use publicly available seismic data. This study aims to analyze the feasibility of using national seismic data for this task. The correspondence between the national seismic data and a dataset provided by the authority responsible for the mine clearance operations is studied. Case studies of individual explosions that have been recorded during passive acoustic monitoring are additionally used for further analysis.