Analysis and modeling of infrasound from a four-stage rocket launch

Blom, Philip; Marcillo, Omar; Arrowsmith, Stephen J.

doi:10.1121/1.4953817

Cited by 11 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…Out of the 60 planned infrasound arrays, currently 49 arrays are certified and sending data in real-time to the International Data Center in Vienna (status in September 2017). Observations of infrasound from rockets on the IMS infrasound arrays are routinely made as shown, for example, by and Blom et al (2016), as expected from the earlier studies.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 56%

Infrasound from the 2009 and 2017 DPRK rocket launches

Evers

Assink

Smets

2018

Geophysical Journal International

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Summary Supersonic rockets generate low-frequency acoustic waves, that is, infrasound, during the launch and re-entry. Infrasound is routinely observed at infrasound arrays from the International Monitoring System, in place for the verification of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Association and source identification are key elements of the verification system. The moving nature of a rocket is a defining criterion in order to distinguish it from an isolated explosion. Here, it is shown how infrasound recordings can be associated, which leads to identification of the rocket. Propagation modelling is included to further constrain the source identification. Four rocket launches by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea in 2009 and 2017 are analysed in which multiple arrays detected the infrasound. Source identification in this region is important for verification purposes. It is concluded that with a passive monitoring technique such as infrasound, characteristics can be remotely obtained on sources of interest, that is, infrasonic intelligence, over 4500+ km.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 56%

Infrasound from the 2009 and 2017 DPRK rocket launches

Evers

Assink

Smets

2018

Geophysical Journal International

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“…For the Space Shuttle, we observe impulsive signals from the solid fuel booster ignition (Blom et al., 2016; Olson, 2012) and ascent between 20:54 and 21:07 UTC, characterized by increasing apparent velocities from left to right, indicative of signal returns from increasing altitudes as time progresses (Pilger et al., 2020; Silber et al., 2018). These are preceded by a second group of signals following the booster separation and descent between 20:45 and 20:53 UTC and a third, weak signature probably from booster splashdown between 20:39 and 20:44 UTC.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

1001 Rocket Launches for Space Missions and Their Infrasonic Signature

Pilger

Hupe

Gaebler

et al. 2021

Geophysical Research Letters

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Infrasound array processing is applied to monitor and characterize atmospheric explosions in the context of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Anyhow, for many infrasound sources the exact location and time are initially unknown and sometimes difficult to precisely estimate afterwards. In contrast, rocket launches are well-defined groundtruth events generating strong infrasonic signatures. During the last decade, the number of rocket launches for sending satellites into Earths orbit and for reaching space strongly increased. We collected ground-truth information for 1001 rocket launches from 27 global spaceports between 2009 and mid 2020 and were able to identify infrasound signatures from up to 73% of the launches on the International Monitoring System of infrasound stations. We use these unique data to estimate the global detectability of such events, to characterize rocket infrasound, to derive an amplitude-energy relation, and to provide the results for further use as a ground-truth reference in geophysical and atmospheric research.

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“…Pilger et al 2021a ). The principal sources are aeroacoustic energy generated by supersonic engine exhaust and the Mach cone that forms when the rocket reaches supersonic velocities (Kaschak et al 1970 ; Cotten and Donn 1971 ; Blom et al 2016 ; McLaughlin et al 2000 ). Two distinct sets of signals are registered, where one group represents the sound from the direction of the launch site (Donn et al 1968 ; Balachandran and Donn 1971 ) and the other represents the sound originating from the re-entry of the first or second stage.…”

Section: Infrasonic Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Signals of a few (3 min; Kaschak et al 1970 ) to several minutes (~ 10 min) in length with gradually increasing and decreasing amplitudes (Balachandran and Donn 1971 ; McLaughlin et al 2000 ) have been detected, with the signal length correlating with the size of the re-entering objects and with burn time in the near field (Blom et al 2016 ). The signal shape changes from impulsive to more emergent with increase in distance (Evers et al 2018 ).…”

Section: Infrasonic Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Natural and Anthropogenic Sources of Seismic, Hydroacoustic, and Infrasonic Waves: Waveforms and Spectral Characteristics (and Their Applicability for Sensor Calibration)

et al. 2022

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The record of seismic, hydroacoustic, and infrasonic waves is essential to detect, identify, and localize sources of both natural and anthropogenic origin. To guarantee traceability and inter-station comparability, as well as an estimation of the measurement uncertainties leading to a better monitoring of natural disasters and environmental aspects, suitable measurement standards and reliable calibration procedures of sensors, especially in the low-frequency range down to 0.01 Hz, are required. Most of all with regard to the design goal of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organisation’s International Monitoring System, which requires the stations to be operational nearly 100% of the time, the on-site calibration during operation is of special importance. The purpose of this paper is to identify suitable excitation sources and elaborate necessary requirements for on-site calibrations. We give an extensive literature review of a large variety of anthropogenic and natural sources of seismic, hydroacoustic, and infrasonic waves, describe their most prominent features regarding signal and spectral characteristics, explicitly highlight some source examples, and evaluate the reviewed sources with respect to requirements for on-site calibrations such as frequency bandwidth, signal properties as well as the applicability in terms of cost–benefit. According to our assessment, earthquakes stand out across all three waveform technologies as a good natural excitation signal meeting the majority of the requirements. Furthermore, microseisms and microbaroms allow a calibration at very low frequencies. We also find that in each waveform technique man-made controlled sources such as drop weights or air guns are in good agreement with the required properties, although limitations may arise regarding the practicability. Using these sources, procedures will be established allowing calibration without record interrupting, thereby improving data quality and the identification of treaty-related events.

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Analysis and modeling of infrasound from a four-stage rocket launch

Cited by 11 publications

References 13 publications

Infrasound from the 2009 and 2017 DPRK rocket launches

Infrasound from the 2009 and 2017 DPRK rocket launches

1001 Rocket Launches for Space Missions and Their Infrasonic Signature

Natural and Anthropogenic Sources of Seismic, Hydroacoustic, and Infrasonic Waves: Waveforms and Spectral Characteristics (and Their Applicability for Sensor Calibration)

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