[HN Gopher] Peeking underground with giant flying antennas
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       Peeking underground with giant flying antennas
        
       Author : sharpshadow
       Score  : 99 points
       Date   : 2024-05-24 13:50 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (hackaday.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (hackaday.com)
        
       | OutOfHere wrote:
       | Could this help detect landmines?
        
         | hausen wrote:
         | Yes, if you scale down the antenna/coil (and the aerial
         | vehicle).
         | https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/a-ukrainian-teenag...
        
         | rolph wrote:
         | this particular rig is too lo-res for that. you need a
         | different detector setup, and slower closer flight.
        
           | polishdude20 wrote:
           | I wonder if drones could be used for this then?
        
             | macnetic wrote:
             | A spinout from my university, UMag Solutions is detecting
             | UXO and mines in Ukraine using special drone-mounted
             | magnetometers.
        
       | buildbot wrote:
       | I'm struck between the similarity between this and the big
       | antenna (?) array that the ballon that went over the USA
       | carried...
        
         | lupusreal wrote:
         | That thing flew over/near Malmstrom Air Force Base (ICBM
         | silos.)
        
           | jjwiseman wrote:
           | Using OpenStreetMap data to map stuff the balloon flew near:
           | https://youtu.be/sQ_sEWodIrc?si=LUfvRR4kvlqQyrZ1&t=16
        
             | dylan604 wrote:
             | I had never heard of this MUNDUS tool before, but it looks
             | like a very interesting project.
        
             | 082349872349872 wrote:
             | Imagine using multiple Project Loon balloons as a giant
             | SAR.
        
               | toomuchtodo wrote:
               | Potentially related:
               | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30022626
        
       | hagbard_c wrote:
       | Something similar was experimented with where I live (western
       | Sweden) to see if the technology is usable to determine the
       | stability of soil layers against land slides. The area around the
       | local river - Gota Alv - is known to be prone to landslides so it
       | was deemed to be a good test subject. A helicopter carrying
       | something which was best described as an enormous chicken run on
       | a long line criss-crossed the area mapping it with what I assume
       | was ground-penetrating radar. The results [1] show our farm to
       | lie on an extremely landslide-prone part of the river valley and
       | I know there have been landslides here in the 60's so there is
       | something to this method. The subsoil consists of silt (the
       | fraction over clay) on top of bedrock, as long as the water
       | content stays below a certain percentage it has quite a high
       | bearing capacity but once it gets over that it easily liquifies.
       | 
       | [1] https://ext-geodatakatalog-
       | forv.lansstyrelsen.se/PlaneringsK...
        
       | Archelaos wrote:
       | Is this used in archeology?
        
         | cebert wrote:
         | Did you read the article? It discusses the archaeological
         | applications.
        
           | mindcrime wrote:
           | From the HN guidelines[1]:
           | 
           |  _Please don 't comment on whether someone read an article.
           | "Did you even read the article? It mentions that" can be
           | shortened to "The article mentions that"._
           | 
           | [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
        
             | IncreasePosts wrote:
             | Do you think the spirit of that rule is to bludgeon someone
             | with it?
        
               | swader999 wrote:
               | Did you even read that rule?
        
               | swores wrote:
               | You and I have different definitions of the word
               | "bludgeon", and I see no problem with showing somebody a
               | site rule they've broken if it's a rule you think worth
               | encouraging people to follow (which they clearly do
               | feel).
        
           | Archelaos wrote:
           | The article mentions the 'traditional' way in which magnetic
           | surveys are carried out on the ground in archaeology. When it
           | comes to helicopter surveys, the examples are only from
           | geology. My question was meant to refer to helicopter
           | surveys. I would therefore like to rephrase it: Have
           | helicopters indeed already been used for magnetic surveys in
           | archaeology?
        
       | foreigner wrote:
       | Can it find tunnels?
        
         | bluGill wrote:
         | Maybe, but can you understand the data you get to realize it is
         | a tunnel?
        
         | m463 wrote:
         | if so, it might be fun to fly over the US-mexican border near
         | tijuana.
        
         | mhb wrote:
         | If not, maybe it could if you pour saltwater into the tunnels.
        
       | aaron695 wrote:
       | We did this for anode placement.
       | 
       | You put a anode x hundred yards away from a pipeline to stop it
       | rusting. We used to send people into the field with metal spikes
       | to measure conductivity to find the best locations. You want the
       | anode in a place of high conductivity. This was used instead.
       | 
       | Personally I was dubious on the economics of a few of the things
       | that was done on the project, doing this compared to using people
       | was a no brainer even if it was $$$$. But all this money and as
       | usual the SCADA was crap.
       | 
       | The rig was from mining if you wonder about it's everyday use.
        
       | ehaskins wrote:
       | I got to watch them operate out of a nearby airport for about a
       | week back in 2022. Definitely an unusual sight.
       | 
       | I'm sure there's more data like this, but that survey seems to
       | have produced a large amount of raw data which is publicly
       | available.
       | 
       | https://www.sciencebase.gov/catalog/item/636c0b28d34ed907bf6...
        
         | defrost wrote:
         | The Hackaday article is referring to Geoscience Australia
         | geophysical surveys, Helicoptor VTEM specifically.
         | 
         | Fixed wing surveys are also a thing and more common over ground
         | that is _relatively_ flat, choppers get used for ground hugging
         | steep ground - the cost per line kilometre goes up by a factor.
         | 
         | All the GA data (radiometrics, EM, magnetics, gravity, DTM's,
         | etc) is available online or by request.
         | 
         | Eg:
         | https://www.ga.gov.au/about/projects/resources/geophysical-a...
         | 
         | describes a dataset and links to raw data sets.
        
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