Statistical Patterns of Transmission Losses of Low-Frequency Sound in Shallow Sea Waveguides with Gaussian and Non-Gaussian Fluctuations

Abstract

Based on the local mode method, the problem of the average intensity (transmission loss) behavior in shallow waveguides with losses in the bottom and fluctuations of the speed of sound in water is considered. It was previously shown that the presence in a waveguide with absorbing penetrable bottom of 2D random inhomogeneities of the speed of sound leads to the appearance of strong fluctuations in the acoustic field already at relatively small distances from the sound source. One of the most important and interesting manifestations of this is the slowing down of the average intensity of the acoustic field compared with a waveguide, which has no such random inhomogeneities of the speed of sound. This paper presents the results of a numerical analysis of the decay of the average field intensity in the presence of both Gaussian and non-Gaussian fluctuations in the speed of sound. It is shown that non-Gaussian fluctuations do not fundamentally change the conclusion about reducing losses during the propagation of a sound signal but can enhance this effect.