Question

State the following statement is true or false:
SONAR is an instrument used to find the height of the mountains.
(A) TRUE
(B) FALSE

Answer 1

Hint: Sonar is a device that uses ultrasonic sound waves to measure the distance, direction and speed of underwater objects usually as you can find in submarine navigation.

Complete step by step answer:
The answer to the question is false, because the instrument used to measure the altitude of an object above sea level is altimeter. The acronym SONAR stands for Sound Navigation and Ranging. Sonar is a device that uses ultrasonic sound propagation (usually underwater, as in submarine navigation) to measure the distance, direction and speed of underwater objects or objects on the surface of water.Sonar consists of a transmitter and a receiver and is installed in a boat or a ship. Transmitter produces and transmits ultrasonic waves; these waves travel through water and if an object is in the path of the sound wave it gets reflected back and returns an “echo” which are then detected by the receiver. The detector converts the ultrasonic waves into electrical signals which are then modelled on a visual system.
The distance of the object that reflected the sound wave can be calculated by knowing the speed of sound in water at a specific temperature and the time taken by sound to come back after reflection. If the time interval between transmission and reception of ultrasound signal is t and the speed of sound through seawater is v. Then total distance, 2d travelled by the ultrasound is: \[2d{\text{ }} = {\text{ }}v{\text{ }} \times {\text{ }}t\].

The above method is called echo-location or echo-ranging. Sonar can be used in air, but it is not as effective because air is less dense than water so sound travels slower through air and dissipates quicker. Echolocation, used by many species of bat, is essentially sonar in air.

Note:In air it is much more effective to use radar instead of sonar because radio waves and microwaves travel through air much faster and better than sound waves do, like how sound waves travel through water better than radio waves and microwaves.