Anomalous sound propagation due to the horizontal variation of seabed acoustic properties

The sound propagation in shallow water is greatly influenced by the acoustic properties of seabed. An anomalous transmission loss was observed in an experiment, and a range dependent bottom model with horizontal variation of seabed acoustic property is proposed and could be well used to explain the anomalous phenomena. It is shown that the horizontal variation of bottom properties has a great effect on underwater sound propagation, and it should be given much attention in sound propagation and geoacoustic inversion problems.