Digital Coast

Details

• Collected by a towfish suspended in the water column behind the survey vessel or mounted on a pole fixed to the vessel hull
• Can capture sediment character and seafloor morphology over large areas
• Ideal for shallow, turbid waters
• Provides suitable source imagery for habitat mapping and sampling planning
• Developed in close cooperation with state and local partners to ensure high levels of accuracy and applicability
• Data available in:
  • Florida - Apalachicola Bay
  • New York - Hudson River

Notes and Limitations: Backscatter pixel values in side-scan sonar imagery are also a function of the gain settings on the instrument during collection. Users should be careful in assuming a given backscatter value represents a particular bottom type over the full extent of side-scan sonar mosaics. Individual survey lines will commonly have an area directly below the transducer in which no data were collected (no backscatter). These voids can be minimized by overlapping survey lines and interpolation, but this type of artifact is inherent to the data.