QTC IMPACT

QTC IMPACT is a powerful tool for extracting information about the seabed from echosounder data. Digital seabed echoes, which can be read from a number of different formats, are processed to define boundaries of discrete acoustic classes of bottom type. Accuracy and repeatability are ensured by using only the first echo-return from the seabed. Seabed echoes are processed to present geo-referenced acoustic classes with no prior knowledge of seabed type using unsupervised classification techniques and automated 3-D clustering. Supervised classification based on a user-defined catalogue of seabed types is also available.

This approach provides unique flexibility in describing the seabed and correlating the data with other information to quantify seabed features or habitat.

Modern echosounders increasingly provide the capability to log the full digital echo from the seabed, not simply the depth. This digital information can be processed for seabed classification. The data from some of these echosounders can be read directly into QTC IMPACT.

QTC IMPACT processes digital echoes from the following systems:

• Biosonics DT4
• Knudsen 320M
• Odom XTF recorded with ChartView
• QTC VIEW Series IV
• QTC VIEW Series V
• Simrad EA400 and EA600
• Data from several other echosounders through processing in SonarData's Echoview . This data is exported to and processed with EchoIMPACT.