There are 361 ports in the United States distributed over 95,000 miles of U.S. coastline that provide high profile targets for terrorist activity.

Insidious attacks from beneath the water are of particular concern. Susceptible maritime assets include both ships and port-side facilities, especially those that handle large quantities of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). Attacks on these resources could produce enormous damage and result in extensive loss of life.

Other high-profile terrorist targets include petroleum tankers, port-side refineries and chemical plants, and off-loading terminals. In-land vulnerabilities exist at dams, locks, levies, and riverfront terminals.

About Waterborne Threat Interdiction System
WVHTC Foundation researchers are now developing an acoustic impulse generator that will deter hostile underwater intruders and disrupting underwater equipment that threaten our ports and our maritime assets.

The WVHTC Foundation generator launches a collimated acoustic wave into the water that has enough energy to deter or disable hostile divers and disrupt their underwater equipment from a great distance. Security personnel can thereby respond to imminent threats over large volumes of open water with the speed of sound. The high degree of collimation provided by the proposed acoustic deterrent assures energy concentration only on the intended target, thereby minimizing collateral damage.

How It Works
The acoustic beam is generated using powerful pulses of electric energy applied to a specially-designed acoustic array. The pulsed-energy system uses an advanced concept developed by WVHTC Foundation team members for electric propulsion experiments within a NASA programThe WVHTC Foundation is developing the Waterborne Threat Interdiction System in conjunction with Western Kentucky University Applied Physics Institute. The project is funded by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) through the National Institute for Homeland Security (NIHS).