TOSSIT: A low-cost, hand deployable, rope-less and acoustically silent mooring for underwater passive acoustic monitoring

Geoacoustic Inversion Using Simple Hand-Deployable Acoustic Systems

“…It is bottom mounted, ropeless, and records acoustic pressure (and optionally temperature) in the water. The whole system is described in detail in [12], and its main features are summarized below. Note that [12] is an "open hardware" publication, which provides potential users with the full recipe to build their own TOSSIT.…”

“…The whole system is described in detail in [12], and its main features are summarized below. Note that [12] is an "open hardware" publication, which provides potential users with the full recipe to build their own TOSSIT. Note also that "TOSSIT" is not an acronym; the system is so named because it can literally be tossed over the side of small vessels.…”

“…Note also that "TOSSIT" is not an acronym; the system is so named because it can literally be tossed over the side of small vessels. For somewhat larger vessel (such as the fishing boat used for this study), a better practice is to gently slide the mooring to the water line using a sling rope (see deployment photographs in [12]). No winch, crane nor A-frame is required.…”

“…The TOSSIT system is designed for operations in water depths of up to 500 m. In practice, the deepest TOSSIT deployment to date took place on the New England Shelf Break at a location where water depth is about 400 m [12]. For the current study on the NEMP, the water depth is about 75 m.…”

“…The setup relies on the use of a TOSSIT ("toss it") receiver mooring and a RIUSS (rupture induced underwater sound source). The TOSSIT is a hand-deployable, tetherless bottom lander with a single hydrophone, an autonomous recorder, and an acoustic release [12]. The RIUSS is a simple expendable source system based on an evacuated vacuum chamber with a membrane that ruptures under hydrostatic pressure, which produces a high-amplitude impulsive signal [13], [14].…”