Buried unexploded ordnance (UXO) is arguably the most serious and prevalent environmental problem currently facing Department of Defense (DoD) facility managers. Not limited to active military bases and test ranges, these problems also occur at DoD sites that are currently dormant and in areas adjacent to military ranges that belong to the civilian sector or are under control of other government agencies. The amount of land affected is generally agreed to be in excess of 10 million acres in the continental United States. UXO mitigation and remediation requirements assume even more compelling proportions when the DoD lands involve formerly used defense sites (FUDS) or base realignment and closure (BRAC) sites. These sites must be cleaned to an appropriate level and certified as suitable for their intended end use. With the support of the Environmental Security Technology Certification Program (ESTCP) Project UX-0031, an airborne version of the multisensor towed array detection system (MTADS) vehicular towed array has been developed and demonstrated. The objective of this project was to produce an efficient and economical UXO survey system with production rates and costs appropriate for surveying large tracts of land. While the system we developed is ideally suited to localizing burial caches of ordnance and establishing which areas are uncontaminated, it also retains the MTADS capability of detecting and locating individual ordnance items the size of 2.75-in rocket warheads (and larger). The system deploys a linear array of seven Cs-vapor magnetometers spaced at 1.5-m intervals in a forward-mounted boom. The system is certified for operation on all models of the Bell Long Ranger helicopter. Two global positioning system (GPS) units mounted on the forward boom provide positioning and helicopter roll and yaw measurements. A pilot guidance display provides survey progress and platform information in real time.


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    Towed Airborne Array System

    C. J. Colby | NTIS | 2000


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