Project DetailsIn this work an acoustic-based algorithm for locating illegal firework launches was developed. Given the sounds from the firework’s launch flight and explosion, which are recorded by a microphone array, the launch point must be located. The main challenge is that, unlike existing geopositioning algorithms, which assume that the distance between the microphones in the array is of the same order of magnitude as the distance from the microphones to the source, in our case, the distance between the microphones is negligible compared to the distance from the array to the source. In addition, the result must be calculated within a few seconds.
The algorithm we have developed is comprised of three stages:
In the first stage, an initial estimation for the launch distance is calculated using the audio from the firework’s launch. In the second stage, the relative direction between the firework and the array is calculated in every point in time. In the third stage, we use the initial estimate, the relative direction, and additional audio features to significantly reduce the error in the distance estimation. Using the launch distance and the relative direction at the moment of launch, the location can be finally calculated.
Our final algorithm calculates the launch location within several seconds, with accuracy of several tens of meters.
