Developing Tools to Track Vocalizing Marine Mammals with Long Baseline Hydrophone Arrays – Year two

My project aims to understand cetacean habitat use in remote areas along Canada’s coast. Using acoustic data from an array of permanently recording hydrophones, I am developing software to automatically detect, classify, and localize different species of whales that use the area .
The acoustic network is located deep in the Great Bear Rainforest in northern British Columbia in thus in important habitat for Northern Resident Killer Whales, humpback whales, and fin whales. At the same time, existing shipping and proposed tanker routes posing a challenge to the marine ecosystem.
The software I am developing within the Mitcas ELEVATE fellowship will provide unprecedented information about activity and behaviour of whales, and possible effects of shipping on their habitat use.My industry partner — WWF-Canada, the Gitga’at First Nation, and the North Coast Cetacean Society — will thus obtain urgently needed data for marine management.

Faculty Supervisor:

Aaron Gulliver

Student:

Benjamin Hendricks

Partner:

World Wildlife Fund

Discipline:

Engineering - computer / electrical

Sector:

Environmental industry

University:

Program: