Case Studies

Detecting Hidden Dangers

Survey

Eggers Kampfmittelbergung, a company embedded within the Eggers Gruppe, specializes in researching and recovering unexploded bombs, ammunition, and other war relics scattered across European land and waterways. With over 500 successful projects, Eggers' ordnance recovery work has become critical, requiring the determination of the exact location of possible war legacy. Initially focused on land-based activities, Eggers Kampfmittelbergung expanded its expertise to include underwater projects a few years ago, using sidescan and single-beam echosounders for UXO survey work. However, the company's experts became interested in the Sonic series multibeam echosounder after attending Oceanology International in 2018, as it offered greater resolution and accuracy for pre-dive analysis. Eggers invested in a Sonic 2024 to improve the survey teams' ability to locate the position of UXOs accurately.

Clarity in Rough Waters

The multibeam echosounder's resolution was tested in a recent survey trip to the Baltic Sea, where despite poor weather, rolling of the survey vessel, and a shallow survey environment of 12m, the data returned was crisp and high quality, impressing the German Navy experts aboard the survey vessel. Eggers also uses TruePix™ to monitor ordnance drift over time, allowing surveyors to observe the effects of tides and currents on the motion of objects resting in different media when areas are re-surveyed at intervals.

Anticipating Underwater Material Type

Moreover, Eggers aims to predict the material type of identified targets using echosounder multispectral backscatter capabilities, which can help discriminate different types of material and increase the safety of divers while saving time and reducing costs. By enhancing the resolution of the multibeam echosounder, Eggers' surveyors can anticipate the type of material they are going to encounter underwater ahead of time, thereby unlocking new business opportunities for the company. Overall, Eggers Kampfmittelbergung's use of state-of-the-art technologies has allowed the company to ensure a safe environment for construction work and navigation while successfully pinpointing and removing UXOs from land and waterways.

The Woods
The Woods