RSS Based Bridge Scour Measurement Using Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Prabhat Dahal, Dongming Peng, Yaoqing (Lamar) Yang, Hamid Sharif

Department of Computer and Electronics Engineering, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, USA.

DOI: 10.4236/cn.2013.53B2115                

Abstract

Bridge Scour is one of the major causes of bridge failures all around the world and there have been significant efforts for its detection and measurement using different acoustic approaches. In this paper, we propose and investigate an effective method to utilize Received Signal Strength (RSS) for measuring scour depth where acoustic sensors are deployed. We also extend a statistical testing to determine the difference in signal levels at the sensor nodes prior to and after scour formation and subsequently determine the actual depth of scour. Additionally, we make an attempt to evaluate underwater distance and depth using signal strength perceived at the receiver which makes it free from the requirement of accurate receiver-sender synchronization in contrast to Time of Flight (ToF) or Time of Arrival (ToA) techniques. The scour depths are eventually compared for the conditions when the bottom is composed of a single or multiple layers. The simulation results clearly show that different depths are calculated for the case of multilayered bottom (0.8 to 3.9 meters for instance) as compared to a constant depth of 2 meters for the case of a single layered bottom.

Keywords

Bridge Scour; Received Signal Strength; Acoustic Wave Propagation; Underwater Acoustic Sensor Networks

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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