Interpretation of borehole magnetometer data for the detection and characterisation of unexploded bombs

Unexploded war-time bombs (UXB) can be found at the ground surface or buried at depths of up to 20 m, where surface-based detection methods become ineffective due to signal weakness and interference. A total-field borehole magnetometer can penetrate to such depths and collect relatively quiet data. However, conventional interpretation techniques suffer from the inherent non-uniqueness in the borehole dimension. In this paper, a constrained optimisation method is utilised for the interpretation of total-field borehole magnetometer data for the detection of deeply buried unexploded bombs. The major advantage over conventional techniques comes from the analytically-derived constraints imposed on the parameter vector by excluding non-geosensible results from consideration and hence reducing the non-uniqueness to a minimal level. A depth dependant objective function is defined to minimise the interference and measurement errors. A test site has been developed for evaluation using real world data. The interpretation results demonstrate its superior capability in handling real-world problems with high non-uniqueness. Furthermore, this method provides a way to estimate the moment strength without knowing the exact position. Together with the modelled signature data for different objects, characterisation of a particular bomb is possible from the inversion of a single total-field borehole profile.