Marine sediment attenuation at low frequencies (under 5 kHz) is generally difficult to be directly measured by in situ probes embedded in the sediment, partly due to the very short propagation distances. An alternate experimental technique is to use single bottom bounce signals received by a vertical line array. The frequency dependence of the sediment attenuation is first obtained by comparing the amplitude differences of the sea floor reflection and the sub bottom layer reflection at different frequencies. The absolute attenuation is then obtained by using the previously estimated sound speed and layer thickness. Inherently there is uncertainty introduced in each stage of the attenuation estimation procedure. To evaluate the uncertainty of the attenuation estimate, the standard deviation of the signal fluctuation is mapped to the intermediat result first, and then Bayesian inversion results of the sound speed and the layer thickness are included in the final attenuation estimates. This uncertainty analysis is demonstrated by the estimation of the sediment attenuation from the low frequency chirp data collected in a variable water column environment in the Shallow Water 06 experiment.

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