Ship noise

This spectrogram shows the acoustic signature of a large ship as it approaches the Pioneer Seamount hydrophone array. The long, continuous, yellow-colored “lines,” or bands of noise, are created by the rotation of the propeller blades. The characteristics of these “blade lines” can be used to identify ship size, characteristics, class, and often individual vessels.

Click here (3,110 kb, 1x) to hear the sound produced by a ship passing over the hydrophone array. Click here (310 kb, 10x) to hear the same sound sped up 10 times