Airborne bathymetric charting using pulsed blue–green lasers

Abstract

Laboratory and airborne experiments have proven the feasibility and demonstrated the techniques of an airborne pulsed laser system for rapidly mapping coastal water bathymetry. Water depths of 10 +/- 0.25 m were recorded in waters having an effective attenuation coefficient of 0.175 m(-1). A2-MW peak power Nd:YAG pulsed laser was flown at an altitude of 600 m. An advanced system, incorporating a mirror scanner, a high pulsed rate laser, and a good signal processor, could survey coastal zones at the rate of several square miles per hour.