Modeling Transient Temperature Distributions Around Landmines in Homogenous Bare Soils
Abstract
The objective of this study is to expand our exploration of the effects of the soil environment on landmine detection by investigating the influence of soil texture and water content on surface soil temperatures above antitank mines buried at 15 cm depth and away from it. Temperature distributions in July were calculated in six soil textures (sandy loam, loam, silt, silt loam sandy clay loam, and clay loam) for the climatic conditions of Kuwait and Sarajevo. We evaluated the temperature distributions in typical dry and wet soil profiles. The simulated temperature differences varied from ,22-.63 degree Celcius in Kuwait to .l6-.37 in Sarajevo. Temperature differences were -with one exception- larger in the wet than in the dry soils which suggests that soil watering may help improve thermal signatures. A major finding of this study is that the thermal signature of an anti tank mine strongly depends on the complex interaction between soil texture, water content, and geographical location. It is very difficult to predict the exact time or even the approximate hour of the appearance or nonappearance of a thermal signature. Therefore, this modeling study indicates that the use of a thermal sensor in a real mine field for instantaneous mine detection carries a high risk. On the other hand if a given area can be monitored constantly with a thermal sensor for twelve hours or longer the thermal signature will be detected if the signal to noise ratio of the mine environment allows so. Field experiments are needed to validate the results of this modeling study.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jan 01, 2001
- Accession Number
- ADA413506
Entities
People
- B. Borchers
- J. M. H. Hendrickx
- J. Simunek
Organizations
- Agricultural Research Service