Landing the Big One

Landing the Big One

Wednesday, February 02, 2005

Port Security - Harbor Defense

Coast Guard seeks to protect ports with powerful sonar system
The security device, set to be unveiled Wednesday, scans port waters and alerts authorities on land to any possible divers. A response boat then drops a second sonar below the surface for confirmation and sends back high-resolution images of the diver.

"Instead of alerting us to every sea lion, manatee or fish, this system will help us identify objects as a diver who just got lost or someone who intends on doing us harm," said Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Alan Tubbs. "To date the Coast Guard's law enforcement has been mostly above water. This is just another capability."


Update: Whoops! Published when I meant to save as a draft. Oh, well. This system seems better than nothing, but is very slow. Detect, investigate, analyze and then? Time consuming and I wonder how effective. My concern would be in areas of restricted visibility and limited operating area, such as the long, narrow ships channel and river areas (the Houston ship channel, Suisun Bay, the Mississippi, as examples. San Diego is not typical. Not that it's easy. I worked in this area for several years and we never hit on the ideal solution.

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