Enhanced Submarine Mast Detection and Discrimination

Toyon proposes to study methods to enhance submarine detection and discrimination by incorporating radar measurements of mast-induced wake signatures. The proposed program includes a detailed analysis to evaluate the potential advantages of this complementary or alternative approach, combining subject matter expertise in radar signal processing and simulation with validated tools for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation of mast wakes and RF simulations of hardbody and wake returns. Mast-wake sea-surface signatures will be produced with a Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics based CFD simulation that efficiently simulates such free-surface flows and enables generation of mast wake signatures for a wide range of vessel behaviors and sea conditions. The simulated mast wake sea-surface signatures will be used in a high-fidelity RF simulation to use radar returns from a variety of airborne sensor geometries to characterize the fundamental detectability of mast wake and hardbody returns in the presence of ocean clutter. These simulation results will enable an investigation of achievable performance using traditional detection methodologies as well as an adaptation of a wind vector estimation method developed on a recent Toyon program. The detection methodologies’ performance will be evaluated and successful methodologies will be adapted for implementation on target sensor systems.