Explosives Monitoring

Underground criminal and terrorist activities pose a serious threat to the security and defense of any country. Today, with the existence of surface control and monitoring tools such as cameras and radars, criminal activities are being conducted away from the visible range of these tools, i.e., underground, and these subterranean threats are increasing. Communication tunnels used for smuggling drugs, weapons, and people are among the underground threats. Also, identifying underground warehouses and shelters dug to hide weapons, missiles, and individuals is of special importance. These types of activities are all carried out deep underground, away from human eyes and security cameras. The excavation of tunnels and construction of underground warehouses is expanding daily and is used by both security agencies and anti-security groups. Security and military agencies are interested in identifying these targets to prevent criminal activities. Given that these targets are located underground, the most important tools that can be used for their identification are geophysical methods. Various geophysical methods help identify and discover these targets. Different geophysical methods are employed based on the type of targets. The most commonly used geophysical methods for security and military issues are: Seismic, Geoelectric, GPR, and Magnetometry.

When household items vibrate or car alarms go off, people often come to believe that their property has been damaged. This can lead to legal complaints that may ultimately result in project suspension and even fines. High noise levels can also pose a threat to the health and safety of workers.

By using seismic monitoring equipment, vibration levels, air blast overpressure, and noise levels at the blast site can be recorded and measured. Since recorded data are almost immediately viewable, blasting operations can be optimized before exceeding legal limits or before causing concern. Data are also recorded and stored for future use or for citation in legal proceedings.

Industry guidelines and standards for permissible vibration and air blast overpressure ranges have been developed and are available. Each blast should be adjusted so that the intensity of seismic and pressure waves generated does not exceed the specified permissible limits. Developed standards define permissible vibration limits for buildings, power pylons, oil and gas pipelines, etc. Geophysical methods also help experts in this field to study seismic and pressure waves resulting from blasts. One of the most commonly used methods for studying blast-induced waves is the seismic method. Seismographs record and store blast-induced waves. By studying the recorded waves, various parameters including their intensity are examined, and then their exceeding or not exceeding the permissible range is determined. Today, performing seismic studies for blasts near residential areas, power pylons, oil pipelines, historical sites, etc., has become a standard and a requirement and is widely used.