GEOPHYSICS, VOL. 71, NO. 5 SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2006; P. H67H78, 14 FIGS.

10.1190/1.2258094

3D seismic refraction traveltime tomography

at a groundwater contamination site

Colin A. Zelt1, Aron Azaria2, and Alan Levander1

tion relies on groundwater reservoirs for drinking water and agricultural production. As populations increase and economies grow, the
potential for groundwater contamination rises, with the result that
groundwater contamination has emerged as a major environmental
problem in many countries. In the United States, this situation has
led to expensive groundwater cleanup, groundwater protection laws,
and environmental protection programs Moore and Jones, 1987.
The U. S. Environmental Protection Agency EPA has identified
more than 1200 contaminated areas that qualify for Superfund cleanup funding Moore et al., 1995.
In 1987, the EPA listed Hill Air Force Base HAFB, Utah Figure
1, as a Superfund site and targeted 11 areas on the site for remediation Environmental ProtectionAgency, 2002. Much of the contamination consists of chlorinated solvents used to clean industrial products, such as jet engines. At Operable Unit 2 OU2 Figure 1, the
solvents dense nonaqueous phase liquids DNAPLs descended into a shallow aquifer comprised mostly of unconsolidated sand
and gravel. The aquifer is bounded below by an impermeable, predominantly clay formation that prevents the solvents from moving
deeper underground. The remediation at OU2 has been ongoing for
more than 10 years and has consisted mainly of surfactant/foam processes to extract both the contaminants and the contaminated water
Hirasaki et al., 1997; Meinardus et al., 2002. More than 200 wells
have been drilled as part of the remediation process. These wells provide point control on the depth to the impermeable clay formation
that bounds the aquifer from below.
In August 2000, personnel from the Department of Earth Science
at Rice University conducted a series of seismic surveys over the
contaminated aquifer at OU2, funded by the U. S. Department of Energy Dana et al., 2001; Gao et al., 2004; Gao et al., 2006. The seismic experiment that is the subject of this paper is a 3D refraction survey covering an area roughly 9540 m.
The application of 3D seismic methods to the shallow environment is a relatively new field. Examples of near-surface 2D refraction tomography studies include Lanz et al. 1998 and Morey and
Schuster 1999. We derive a 3D P-wave velocity model to about

ABSTRACT
We have applied traveltime tomography to 3D seismic refraction data collected at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, in an approximately 95 40-m area over a shallow 20 m
groundwater contamination site. The purpose of this study is
to test the ability of 3D first-arrival-time data to characterize
the shallow environment and aid remediation efforts. The
aquifer is bounded below by a clay aquiclude, into which a
paleochannel has been incised and acts as a trap for dense
nonaqueous phase liquid DNAPL contaminants. A regularized nonlinear tomographic approach was applied to 187,877
first-arrival traveltimes to obtain the smoothest minimumstructure 3D velocity model. The resulting velocity model
contains a velocity increase from less than 300 to 1500 m/s
in the upper 15 m. The model also contains a north-southtrending low-velocity feature interpreted to be the paleochannel, based on more than 100 wells in the area. Checkerboard
tests show 7.510 m lateral resolution throughout most of the
model.
The preferred final model was chosen after a systematic
test of the free parameters involved in the tomographic approach, including the starting model. The final velocity model compares favorably with a 3D poststack depth migration
and 2D waveform inversion of coincident reflection data.
While the long-wavelength features of the model reveal the
primary target of the survey, the paleochannel, the velocity
model is likely a very smooth characterization of the true velocity structure, particularly in the vertical direction, given
the size of the first Fresnel zone for these data.

INTRODUCTION
More than 20% of the earths freshwater is beneath the land surface Dunne and Leopold, 1978, and much of the worlds popula-

Manuscript received by the Editor October 16, 2005; revised manuscript received February 28, 2006; published online September 5, 2006.
1
Rice University, Department of Earth Science, 6100 Main St., Houston, Texas 77251. E-mail: czelt@rice.edu; alan@rice.edu.
2
Formerly Rice University, Department of Earth Science, Houston, Texas; presently Compagnie Generale de Geophysique CGG, Houston, Texas. E-mail:
aronazaria@yahoo.com.
2006 Society of Exploration Geophysicists. All rights reserved.

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15 m depth by inverting first-arrival traveltimes using the regularized inversion algorithm of Zelt and Barton 1998. This algorithm
typically has been applied to crustal-scale 3D data sets e.g.,
Schlindwein et al., 2003; Ramachandran et al., 2004, although
Deen and Gohl 2002 have used it in a mining application to approximately 100 m depth. This is the first time the Zelt and Barton
1998 algorithm has been applied in three dimensions to the nearsurface 20 m environment. Dana et al. 1999 have applied the
Zelt and Barton algorithm to 2D data from a pilot survey at OU2 and
imaged the known geology and a channel feature important to remediation efforts.
The areal dimensions of the 3D study area are nearly 1000 times
smaller than a typical crustal survey study area, but the center frequency is only about 10 times higher; the typical center frequency
for crustal data is approximately 5 Hz. Therefore, a wave traveling
the length of the model 100 m consists of only 510 wavelengths
at the center frequency. The relative change in velocity over a short
distance is also very different from a crustal survey. From the 2D pilot study, we know that velocity increases by at least a factor of five
in the upper 15 m Dana et al., 1999 or a velocity gradient of
80 s1, compared with a typical crustal velocity gradient of
0.1 s1. Our study serves as a test of the 3D refraction method to
characterize the shallow environment accurately and thereby to aid
remediation efforts. The resulting 3D velocity model is compared to
the known structure of the subsurface from well data and the results
of other seismic surveys at the site.

GEOLOGIC SETTING AND SITE

CHARACTERIZATION
Hill Air Force Base is located 60 km north of Salt Lake City, Utah,
west of the Wasatch Mountains and east of the Great Salt Lake Figure 1. The Great Salt Lake is a remnant of the ancient glacial Lake
Bonneville, a large terminal lake that existed roughly 32,000
14,000 years ago. The Weber River delta, which supplied Lake Bonneville, is between the Wasatch Mountains and the Great Salt Lake.
It was formed during the Pleistocene epoch by the Weber River as it
flowed into the eastern edge of Lake Bonneville Curry, 1980.
HAFB is built on a plateau west of the Weber River Valley and

rests on deltaic sediments of the Provo Formation, composed primarily of sand and gravel. The Provo Formation was deposited as sheetflood lobes, braided channels, sieve deposits, and debris flow on a
wave-reworked lacustrine fan delta Curry, 1980. The Weber delta
changed locations many times, leading to the deposition of laterally
heterogeneous sands and gravels Feth, 1955. Beneath the Provo
Formation, which ranges in thickness from 215 m, lies the Alpine
Formation, composed primarily of clay and silt and also a product of
Weber delta deposition during the Pleistocene. The Alpine Formation is at least 17 m thick, and Cambrian basement lies beneath it.
HAFB has been active since the early 1940s and covers 27 km2
Figure 1. For about 20 years, liquid degreasing solvents and jet
fuel were deposited as waste into the ground at various sites located
at the outer edges of the base. These sites include landfills, disposal
pits, and spill areas. HAFB began investigating releases in 1976
when a civilian reported an orange discharge from a spring on his
property near the base boundary Environmental Protection Agency,
2002. As a result, the Air Force, Utah Department of Environmental
Quality, and EPA began investigating and cleaning up the contamination. The EPA placed HAFB on the Superfund National Priorities
list on July 22, 1987.
Site OU2 is located on the northeastern boundary of HAFB and
was used from 1967 to 1975 to dispose unknown quantities of solvents into at least two unlined disposal trenches. The disposal process resulted in groundwater contamination from trichloroethene
TCE, trichloroethane TCA, and tetrachloroethylene PCE Oolman et al., 1995. These solvents are DNAPLs because they are immiscible with water and have a higher density than water. During
vertical migration, DNAPLs may be captured by capillary forces in
the aquifers pore space, but most of the substance will sink until it
comes in contact with a low-permeability surface, resulting in the
formation of DNAPL pools at the bottom of the aquifer. More than
200 monitoring wells drilled as part of the remediation efforts at
OU2 have shown that pools of DNAPL lie at the base of the Provo
Formation at depths of 1015 m Hirasaki et al., 1997. The underlying Alpine Formation functions as an impermeable boundary to the
DNAPL and the shallowest water table at approximately 910 m below the surface.
Accurate characterization of the top of the Alpine Formation is integral for remediation efforts because the DNAPL tends to pond in
the topographic lows at the top of the clay surface. The depth to the
clay surface was recorded at 267 monitoring wells at OU2, of which
141 are within the 9540 m area of the 3D refraction survey. The topography of the clay surface determined from the well data led to the
discovery of a paleochannel incised into the clay, trending roughly
north to south Figure 2. At OU1, 1.3 km southeast of OU2, Young
and Sun 1996, 1998 used ground penetrating radar GPR to image
the top of the clay, although the presence of clay strongly attenuated
the GPR signal. Nevertheless, their results clearly demonstrate the
strong heterogeneity of the local geology.

3D EXPERIMENT AND DATA

Figure 1. Aerial photo of Hill Air Force Base. The study area is in
Operable Unit 2 in the northeast section of the base near the Weber
Canal. Dashed line marks the boundary of the base. Inset shows location of base in northeastern Utah between the Wasatch Range and
the Great Salt Lake.

In 2000, a team of about 20 people led by personnel from the Department of Earth Science at Rice University conducted a series of
seismic experiments at OU2, including a 3D refraction survey, 3D
reflection survey Dana et al., 2001; Gao et al., 2004, and combined
dual vertical seismic profile/surface experiment Gao et al., 2006.
The 3D refraction and reflection experiments both occupied an area
of roughly 9540 m, centered over a portion of the buried pale-

3D seismic refraction tomography

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midpoint CMP stack, and the results of 2D waveform inversion of

ochannel Figure 2. The seismic experiments were surveyed using a
Topcon Total Station unit, providing location accuracy of better than
the reflection data are presented later.
10 cm. The ground surface is fairly smooth, with a gradual increase
in elevation to the south and a total relief of about 2.5 m. The average
elevation is nearly 1 m above the survey datum, which corresponds
Traveltime picking and uncertainties
to 1430 m above sea level; this datum is zero in our models.
A semiautomated interactive picking program was used to pick
The 3D refraction survey geometry consists of a single deploythe first arrivals of the 360,000 traces. A total of 187,877 picks from
ment of 601 receivers in a stationary grid, each receiver consisting of
349 shots were made; the remaining 40% of the shots were not picka single-channel RefTek 125 Texan recorder attached to a 40-Hz
able because of noise Figure 2. Traveltimes were picked from shot
Mark Products vertical geophone Figure 2. There are 45 east-west
gathers plotted versus offset in 12 azimuth bins Figure 4. The bin
lines consisting of alternating rows of 13 and 14 geophones with an
aperture
is a compromise between minimizing the variability in
inline receiver interval of 2.8 m. The crossline spacing is 2.1 m,
first-arrival
time at different azimuths as a result of 3D structure and
with each line staggered by 1.4 m relative to the adjacent line. Tomaximizing the number of traces. About every tenth trace was
ward the southern end of the survey, the lines systematically shift to the east, ending roughly 7 m
east of the lines in the north Figure 2. The shot
locations are 0.3 m east of each receiver station.
A single shot from a .223-caliber rifle was fired
into a 6-cm-deep hole drilled into the ground beside each receiver. Because of onsite obstacles
such as propane tanks and trailers, 48 shot or receiver stations deviate slightly from the standard
geometry and seven stations have no shots or receivers, while no shots were fired at an additional
five stations. There were 596 shots, yielding
about 360,000 traces and a maximum source-receiver offset of 102 m. To our knowledge, this is
the most dense 3D refraction experiment in terms
of the number of shots and receivers 600
each.
The data were recorded using a 1-ms sample
rate and contain frequencies ranging from about
40250 Hz Figure 3. The dominant frequency
varies from 40 to 80 Hz. The data were processed minimally using only a 4080240400
-Hz band-pass filter and notch filters of 60 and
120 Hz to remove ground roll, low-frequency
cultural noise, and noise from onsite electrical
equipment. After filtering, the dominant frequency of the data is near 75 Hz Figures 3 and 4. The
airwave obscures refracted energy at offsets less
than about 12 m because the seismic velocity of
air 330 m/s is faster than the seismic velocity
of the near surface Dana et al., 1999. Despite
filtering, the data contain significant noise from
U. S. Air Force jets and remediation activities, including pumps in monitoring, injection, and extraction wells.
A 3D reflection experiment was carried out
over the same area as the refraction experiment
using the same east-west recording lines and rifle
source as the refraction survey Dana et al., 2001;
Gao et al., 2004. The survey took 16 days to
complete, compared to two days for the refraction
survey, and produced a nominal fold of 52. The
reflection survey took more time because it involved many more shots and a rolling geophone
Figure 2. Experimental geometry of 3D refraction survey superimposed on the depth to
array, as compared to a static array for the refracclay from well data. White xs are shot locations. Green circles indicate shots for which
tion survey.Acomparison of the 3D refraction vetraveltimes were picked. Black dots are receiver stations. Pink dots are well locations.
locity model with a 3D depth-migrated commonThere is some clipping of the depths to emphasize the paleochannel structure.

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picked manually, and an automatic picker was applied to the intervening traces using the crosscorrelation between the unpicked traces
and the two adjacent picked traces.

Figure 3. Frequency spectrum for a typical raw dashed and filtered

solid shot gather using a filter with notches at 60 and 120 Hz and a
40-80-240-400-Hz band-pass. The spectra have been normalized to
the same peak value.

Figure 4. Data examples. The traces for three shot gathers are plotted
versus source-receiver offset within a 12 azimuth bin. Plot of the
survey geometry to the right of each gather shows the shot location
large dot and the trace aperture window. The data are shown trace
normalized and filtered as described in Figure 3. First-arrival picks
are indicated by horizontal marks on each trace.

The uniform areal distribution of shots and receivers over the survey area has the advantage of providing uniform illumination of the
subsurface but the disadvantage of spatial aliasing in both the inline
and crossline direction. Results from a 2D pilot survey at OU2 using
a 0.35-m receiver spacing clearly show that the near-offset
12 m refracted P-wave is slower than the airwave Dana et al.,
1999. However, it generally is impossible to distinguish the refracted arrival from the airwave in the 3D data because of the coarser receiver spacing 2.8 m inline and 2.1 m crossline. Therefore, the
first-arriving energy, interpreted to be an amalgamation of the airwave and refracted wave, was picked and regarded as a body wave.
The effect this has on the final model is addressed later. Only about
10% of the picks are in this near-offset region 12 m; Figure 5a
The target of the survey, the paleochannel, is up to 15 m below the
surface Figure 2. For refracted waves to sample to this depth, a
minimum offset of 25 m is required, based on the results of the 2D
pilot survey Dana et al., 1999. About 67% of the picks have an offset greater than 25 m, providing confidence that the paleochannel is
sampled adequately by the data.
The dominant frequency of the filtered data is roughly 75 Hz, corresponding to a quarter-period of 3.3 ms. A rule of thumb for picking
accuracy is that an arrival can be identified at best to within onequarter of the dominant period because if two waves arrive within
this interval, they will add constructively and cannot be distinguished from one another. Picking accuracy is further degraded by
the presence of noise. To estimate the total pick uncertainty, the time
difference of the picks from reciprocal source-receiver pairs was examined Figure 5b. About 56% of the reciprocal pairs are within
5 ms, and 86% are within 10 ms. Considering the frequency content
of the data and the reciprocal differences, picks were assigned an uncertainty of 5 ms for traveltime inversion.

Figure 5. a Histogram of number of traveltime picks versus sourcereceiver offset in 2.1-m bins. b Histogram of number of shot-receiver pairs versus reciprocal time difference in 1-ms bins.

3D seismic refraction tomography

3D REFRACTION TOMOGRAPHY
We use the 3D first-arrival regularized tomographic method of
Zelt and Barton 1998 in which the simplest model is sought that
predicts the picked traveltimes to within an accuracy consistent with
their assigned uncertainties. This algorithm is designed to yield a
model with the minimum amount of structure required by the data.
Traveltime inversion is a nonlinear problem because the raypaths are
dependent on the velocity model. Therefore, a linearized iterative
approach is applied using a Taylor series expansion in which a starting model is required and the model and raypaths are updated over a
series of iterations until the normalized misfit 2 between the observed and predicted data ideally reaches one Bevington, 1969:
N

to tip
1
= i
N i=1
i
2

where N is the number of data points, toi and tip are the ith observed
and predicted traveltime, and i is the assigned picking uncertainty.
At each iteration, an objective function , which measures a combination of the data misfit and the structure of the model, is minimized in the least-squares sense Menke 1989:
T T
T T
s = tTC1
d t + s Wh Whs + sz s Wv Wv s

+ 1 sTWTp W p s,

where t is the traveltime misfit vector, s is the model slowness vector, s is the perturbed model vector equal to s so, so is the starting
model vector, Cd is the data covariance matrix that contains the estimated pick uncertainties, W p is the perturbation weighting matrix,
and Wh and Wv are the horizontal and vertical roughness matrices,
respectively. The perturbation weighting matrix is a diagonal matrix
containing the reciprocal of the starting slowness values; it measures
the relative perturbation of the current model from the starting model. The roughness matrices are second-order spatial finite-difference
operators that measure the roughness of the model in the horizontal
and vertical directions. These operators are normalized also by the
starting slowness value at the center of the operator Zelt and Barton,
1998.
The parameters , , and sz control the weight of the terms in the
objective function. The parameter determines the overall amount
of regularization and is not strictly free, in that it is reduced systematically by the algorithm from a free-parameter starting value o. The
systematic reduction of with each iteration by a factor r stabilizes
the inversion by constraining the long-wavelength model structure
in the initial iterations and by allowing finer model structure in later
iterations. The parameter determines the relative weight of the second derivative and perturbation regularization; perturbation regularization is not part of the original Zelt and Barton 1998 algorithm,
equivalent to using an value of one. The value sz governs the relative weight of the vertical and horizontal smoothing regularization.
The final free parameter is the number of iterations of the conjugate
gradient algorithm Nlsq, used to solve the large sparse system of linear equations at each iteration Zelt and Barton, 1998. The free-parameter values were varied to facilitate a systematic exploration of
the model space to determine the simplest and most geologically reasonable model that fits the data.
The model parameterization for the forward calculation of traveltimes and raypaths is a uniform 1-m node spacing. The 3D finite-difference eikonal solver of Vidale 1990, with modifications for large

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velocity gradients by Hole and Zelt 1995, is used. For the inverse
step, the model is divided into cells of constant slowness. The cell
size is chosen to balance the trade-off between increased resolution
using smaller cells and increased constraint on the slowness values
using larger cells. In practice, the largest cell size is used that allows
the data to be fit within their uncertainties according to equation 1. A
cell size of 221 m in the x-, y-, and z-directions, respectively, is
used. The model dimensions are 60 110 28 m, resulting in
46,200 cells.

Starting model
The study area consists of two sedimentary formations. The surface layer, the Provo Formation, is comprised primarily of sand and
gravel, while the buried Alpine Formation is primarily clay. From
the well data, we know the clay top is at 215 m depth and is incised
by a paleochannel Figure 2; the water table is at 910 m depth.
Two wells separated by 1.8 m show a difference in clay depth of
11.7 m. The true velocity field is therefore expected to be laterally
and vertically complex. The only prior information concerning 3D
structure is the depth to clay from the well data, but this is what we
want to determine using the seismic data. Therefore, we use 1D starting models as a test of 3D refraction tomography in a complex nearsurface environment.
Three different starting models were tested Figure 6. Because
the airwave obscures the refracted wave in the near-offset region, we
know the seismic velocity at the surface is less than the velocity of air
nearly 330 m/s. Based on the results of the 2D pilot survey Dana
et al. 1999, a surface velocity of about 200 m/s is used for each
model Figure 6. The velocity increases rapidly with depth in each
model and approaches the seismic velocity of water to account for
the water table at 910 m. Each starting model increases with differ-

Figure 6. Three 1D starting models. Model A is preferred. Model B is

slower than the model A from 09 m. Model C is faster than the
model A from 013 m.

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Zelt et al.

ent gradients in depth until about 12 m depth, where they converge

at roughly 1400 m/s and then slowly increase to slightly more than
1600 m/s at 25 m depth. Starting model A is constructed by laterally
averaging the 3D final models from some preliminary inversions of
the data. Starting models B and C are designed to test the sensitivity
of the results using slower and faster models, respectively.

RESULTS
The preferred final model was determined after numerous inversions using the three starting models and a range of free-parameter
values. In this way, model nonuniqueness was explored, in that different models were obtained that fit the data similarly according to
equation 1. The preferred final model was selected in accordance
with Occams principle of minimum structure e.g., Constable et al.,
1987 to avoid overinterpreting the data. Starting model A Figure 6
was used to produce the final preferred model. The starting rms traveltime misfit is 9.25 ms 2 = 3.42, and the misfit provided by the
preferred final model after eight iterations is 5.39 ms 2 = 1.16
Figure 7. We could not achieve 2 = 1, probably because of the
number of reciprocal time differences greater than 5 ms Figure 5b.
The preferred free-parameter values are o = 5000, r = 1.317,
= 1.0, sz = 0.4, and Nlsq = 250.
Figure 8a shows horizontal slices of the difference between the
preferred final model and the starting model. A coherent low-velocity anomaly that trends roughly north-south is evident in each slice.
The anomaly curves slightly eastward in the north, where it reaches
its largest value of around 250 m/s perturbation from the starting
model and widens to cover almost the full width of the model. It disappears south of about y = 80 m. The anomaly increases in coherence and magnitude until 12 m depth; it loses coherence below
this. It shows considerable lateral variation, notably in the xdirection, where it can change by more than 300 m/s in roughly
15 m. The shape of the low-velocity anomaly is generally consistent
with the paleochannel from the well data.

Figure 9 shows east-west cross sections through the preferred final model. There is considerable heterogeneity in the upper 4 m of
the model. Below 4 m, the model is generally smoother without any
sharp features, and the isovelocity contours take the form of a broad
depression, with the center roughly in agreement with the center of
the paleochannel from the well data; this is the prominent northsouth low-velocity anomaly seen in the horizontal slices.

Model assessment
To assess the robustness of the preferred final model, we have applied a number of tests and examined the ray coverage.

Ray coverage
Ray coverage is a rough indicator of how well the model is constrained at a particular point Figures 8b and 10. Ray coverage is a
maximum between 8 and 12 m depth, with the deepest rays reaching
nearly 21 m. Ray coverage is concentrated toward the eastern side of
the model between x values of 015 m and y values of 2090 m.
Rays are concentrated on the east because of the velocity structure,
i.e., avoiding the low-velocity paleochannel, and also because the
survey geometry shifts to the east at the southern end of the study
area Figure 1.

Alternative starting models

Figure 11 shows a slice at z = 10 m from the preferred final model
in comparison with eight alternative final models. The normalized
misfits for the final models obtained from starting models B and C
were both 1.17, essentially the same fit as the preferred final model
2 = 1.16. Both alternative final models show a north-south-trending low-velocity anomaly similar to the preferred final model. Shallower depth slices through the models obtained using starting models B and C show consistently faster and slower perturbations, respectively, compared to the preferred final model at the same depth.
This indicates starting model B is biased slow and starting model C
is biased fast. However, the absolute velocities in these alternative
models are very similar to the preferred final model, illustrating the
robustness of the tomographic technique to biased starting models.

Free parameters

Figure 7. Traveltime residuals for the preferred starting model and

preferred final model as a function of source-receiver offset. The rms
traveltime misfit for the starting and final models is 9.25 ms 2
= 3.42 and 5.39 ms 2 = 1.16, respectively.

The alternative final models shown in Figure 11 are obtained by

varying the free-parameter values to o = 10,000, r = 1.414,
= 0.95, sz = 0.3, and Nlsq = 325. For these runs, the preferred starting model A was used and all free parameter values were the same as
for the preferred final model, except for the one being varied. The
five final models provide normalized misfits of 1.061.19. These
models contain the north-south-trending low-velocity anomaly, although they are generally rougher than the preferred model. The exception to this is the model obtained using sz = 0.3, which is smoother than the preferred final model in this horizontal slice but is rougher
in the vertical direction, as expected using a smaller value of sz than
that used for the preferred final model. Increasing sz from 0.3 to 0.4
added little horizontal roughness but significantly decreased vertical
roughness. Increasing sz from 0.4 to 0.5 did not substantially smooth
the model vertically but increased horizontal roughness, leading to
the preferred sz value of 0.4. All of the models obtained by varying
the free parameters are viable because they similarly fit the data according to equation 1, but the preferred final model was the smoothest.

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DISCUSSION

Because refracted body waves were not distinguished confidently

from the airwave in the near-offset region and because the near-offset picks predominantly influence the shallow part of the model,
there is some question as to how the near-offset picks might affect
the deeper structure of the model. An inversion was run in which velocities above 3 m were laterally homogeneous
and fixed at the preferred starting model values;
these values are based on the results of a 2D pilot
survey in which refracted arrivals were identified
in the near-offset region behind the airwave. The
north-south-trending low-velocity anomaly is
present in the final model Figure 11i, although
the magnitude of the variations are about 100 m/s
greater than the preferred model at this depth and
the model is rougher than the preferred final model at all depths below 3 m. The normalized misfit
of 1.21 for this model is the poorest of any of the
alternative final models, although this is, in part,
from the inability to fit the near-offset picks closely because the shallow portion of the model is
fixed.

The geology at OU2 consists of heterogeneous unconsolidated

sediments above a predominantly clay formation with an incised paleochannel. Large changes in velocity occur over short distances
both laterally and vertically, based on extensive well data and a 2D
pilot study Dana et al., 1999. The final velocity model increases
rapidly with depth, from approximately 200 m/s at the surface to
1500 m/s at 1215 m depth Figure 9. The model is more heteroge-

Lateral resolution
We have estimated the lateral resolution of the
preferred final model using Zelts method 1998,
which has been used in a number of 3D refraction
studies e.g., Day et al., 2001; Zelt et al., 2001;
Morgan et al., 2002. The method consists of a series of checkerboard tests using the source-receiver geometry of the picked data. The preferred
starting model and preferred free-parameter values are used, and Gaussian noise is added to the
synthetic data using a standard deviation equal to
the assigned picking uncertainty, 5 ms. Five
anomaly sizes were tested: 5, 7.5, 10, 15, and
20 m Figure 12. Velocity anomalies of 35% ensured the initial misfits were similar to the initial
misfit of the real data for the preferred starting
model. The semblance between the recovered
anomaly pattern and the true anomaly pattern was
calculated at each model node. A semblance value of 0.7 is the threshold for good resolution at the
length scale of the anomaly size Zelt, 1998.
At z = 10 m, much of the central part of the
model has a lateral resolution of at least 7.5 m,
and most of the model at this depth has a resolution of at least 10 m Figure 12. Zelts method
1998 determines the lateral resolution of the
model by estimating the anomaly size that would
yield a semblance of 0.7 at each model node Figure 8c. Resolution exceeds 7.5 m throughout
most of the model down to 10 m depth. Resolution at the 10-m length scale includes most of the
model to 12 m depth and the central part of the
model down to 14 m.

Figure 8. a Preferred final model displayed as perturbations with respect to the preferred
starting model for depths from 614 m as labeled. Depth to clay contours in green from
the well data for 711 m overlay the 8- and 10-m slices. Black contour interval is
100 m/s. Unsampled regions at the edges are white. b The number of rays that pass
through each model cell corresponding to the depth slices in a. Black contour interval is
200 rays. Unsampled regions are white. c Lateral velocity resolution corresponding to
the depth slices in a. The 7.5-m contour is white; the 10-m contour is black. Black regions have better than 5 m resolution; white regions have worse than 20 m resolution or
are unsampled.

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Zelt et al.

neous in the upper 4 m, likely a reflection of the complexity of the

unconsolidated near-surface sediments and consistent with higherresolution waveform inversion results Gao et al., 2006; Gao et al.,
2004. The model becomes significantly smoother below 4 m, with
the isovelocity contours taking a generally concave-up shape and
with the deepest point being 23 m lower than at the edges of the
model. The deepest points generally coincide with the incised paleochannel as defined by the well data, although the channel in the refraction model, is smoother than the well data indicate Figure 9.
The vertical cross sections suggest the velocity, in a very smooth

Figure 9. East-west cross sections through the preferred final model

at y-positions as labeled. The clay layer from the well data overlays
the model in white. Arrow indicates known water table at 910 m.
Contour interval is 100 m/s; thick contour is 1000 m/s. Unsampled
regions are white.

way, is consistent with the known geology and site conditions. The
low velocities of the sand-gravel Provo Formation overlie the higher-velocity clay Alpine Formation, which has a nearly 10-m-deep
north-south-trending trough in its top, forming the paleochannel,
and a water table at 910 m depth.
The water table may reduce the velocity anomaly that would otherwise be associated with the paleochannel below 910 m and could
therefore, at least in part, explain the very smooth nature of the deep
portion of our model. It is typical for the saturated zone to be shallower in clay than in sand because of capillary forces, and the transition in clay occurs over a broader interval. Therefore, we would expect the water table to follow the shape of the channel, although it
will be smoothed laterally and to a lesser extent vertically. Also,
since saturated clay is typically a bit slower than saturated sand, the
base of the channel may correspond to a velocity decrease. In any
event, the deep velocity structure is likely the result of a combination
of lithology and water saturation, which is greatly smoothed out in
the model from the resolution of the data.
The horizontal slices of the velocity perturbations are dominated
by a north-south-trending low-velocity anomaly that curves slightly
to the northeast in the north Figure 8a. The anomaly increases in
area and velocity fluctuation with depth, peaking between 10 and
12 m depth and then diminishing and losing continuity below this.
The anomaly at 1012-m depth ranges from the edge of the model in
the north to about y = 80 m in the south and roughly narrows in
width from about 30 m to 10 m over this distance. As discussed, the
anomaly is well resolved, with a lateral resolution at 1012 m depth
better than 10 m throughout most of the model and better than 7.5 m
through much of it Figure 8c. The outline of the low-velocity

Figure 10. Raypaths through the preferred final model projected into
the x-y and y-z planes. For clarity, every 200th raypath is shown.

3D seismic refraction tomography

anomaly is consistent with the general shape of the paleochannel
from the well data Figure 8a, suggesting the paleochannel incised
into the clay layer influences the long-wavelength velocity structure.
At a given depth, the velocities are generally higher at the south end
of the model than at the north Figure 8a, perhaps because the sur-

H75

face elevation is roughly 1 m higher in the south, resulting in greater

consolidation and higher velocities.

Fresnel zones
The size of the first Fresnel zone and the picking uncertainty provide insight into the smoothness of the final model because they are
related to the spatial resolution. For first-arrival traveltime tomography, the Fresnel zone is the volume within which any scattered wave
will arrive within one-quarter period of the dominant frequency of
the first arrival roughly 3.3 ms for these data. As a result, any heterogeneity within the Fresnel zone is averaged, although overlapping Fresnel zones from different source-receiver pairs makes it possible for traveltimes to resolve details that are nearly 60% of the
Fresnel zones dimensions Pratt et al., 2002. Ray-theoretical
Fresnel zones are calculated by summing the first-arrival-time fields
from the source and receiver points and by contouring the traveltime
corresponding to the first-arrival time between the two points, plus
one-quarter of the dominant period. The volume within the contour
corresponds to the first Fresnel zone because it represents all subsurface points from which scattered energy between the source and receiver will arrive within one-quarter period of the first arrival.
Consider four representative Fresnel zones for refracted raypaths
through the final model with offsets of 15, 30, 60, and 90 m that bottom above, within, and beneath the paleochannel Figure 13. The
greater heterogeneity in the upper 4 m of the model Figure 9 could
be a good representation of the true structure, given the more localized shape of the Fresnel zones in the upper 4 m, although contamination of the short-offset first arrivals by the airwave for this experiment must be factored in. The results of the checkerboard tests indicate lateral resolution exceeds 5 m in the upper 5 m throughout most
of the model.

Figure 11. The preferred final model and eight alternative final models at 10 m depth, displayed as perturbations with respect to the starting model. The reference velocity at this depth in the preferred starting model is 1150 m/s. The preferred final model is in the center; the
other models are obtained using a starting model B, b starting
model C, c, e o = 10 000, d r = 1.4142, f = 0.95, g sz
= 0.3, h Nlsq = 325, and i model above 3 m fixed at starting-model values see text for details. The preferred starting model e is
produced using starting model A in Figure 6 and free-parameter values o = 5000, r = 1.3173, = 1.00, sz = 0.4, and Nlsq = 250.
Black contour interval is 100 m/s. Depth-to-clay contours green
from the well data for 711 m overlay the models. White edges are
unsampled regions.

Figure 12. Recovered checkerboard anomaly patterns top row and

corresponding semblance values bottom row at z = 10 m for the
five anomaly sizes: 5, 7.5, 10, 15, and 20 m. The boundaries of the
true checkerboard pattern overlay the recovered perturbations. In the
semblance plots, the contour interval is 0.1; the 0.7 contour is white.

H76

Zelt et al.

The Fresnel zones are thickest and broadest approximately halfway between the source and receiver, where they are as much as
1520 m vertically and 1530 m horizontally for raypaths that sample the paleochannel. Although large, the overlapping Fresnel zones
at the target depth of about 10 m, arising from many different

source-receiver pairs, make it possible to resolve lateral variations in

the paleochannel on a length scale consistent with the resolution derived from the checkerboard tests Figure 8c. However, for vertical
resolution at the target depth approximately 10 m, every Fresnel
zone with an offset of 2540 m that bottoms near the target depth
will average the structure over the entire depth range of interest. As a
result, the traveltime data will only sense a very smooth vertical gradient. It is not possible to determine from the traveltime data whether
the final model accurately describes a smooth velocity increase at the
clay contact or the water table or whether a sharp velocity contrast
exists but is smoothed out because of the size of the Fresnel zones.
Thus, it is prudent to refrain from viewing the velocity values in the
final model as localized point measurements. Regardless of the inability to determine the precise nature of the velocity increase resulting from a change in lithology or the water table, the lateral geometry
of the paleochannel is resolved within the final model at a length
scale of 7.510 m. We estimate that a dominant frequency of approximately 200 Hz and a picking error of about 2 ms would be required to infer anything about the nature of the clay contact or the
water table.

Comparison with reflection data and

waveform inversion

Figure 13. Comparison of first Fresnel zones in the final model for a
center frequency of 75 Hz and source-receiver offsets of 15, 30, 60,
and 90 m. top Vertical cross section through the Fresnel zones at x
= 0 m. bottom Horizontal cross sections at 4, 10, and 16 m depth.
The 10-m depth-to-clay contour from the well data overlays the 10
-m cross section in gray.

Figure 14. a Horizontal slice of the preferred velocity model perturbations at 10 m depth. b Depth to the 800-m/s isovelocity surface from 2D full waveform inversion of the 45 east-west 2D reflections lines Gao et al., 2004. c Horizontal slice of the poststack 3D
depth-migrated reflectivity from the reflection data at 10 m depth
Fradelizio et al., 2004. The 7- and 10-m depth-to-clay contours
from the well data are labeled. White edges are unsampled regions.

Figure 14 compares a slice at z = 10 m from the preferred final

model with results from waveform inversion of the 2D reflection
data along each east-west line and a migrated stack of the 3D reflection data. The waveform result is presented in the form of depth to
the 800-m/s velocity contour, interpreted by Gao et al., 2004 to be
the clay top. The 3D reflection data are presented as a depth slice at
10 m from a poststack 3D depth-migrated volume Fradelizio et al.,
2004. Although the waveform isovelocity surface shows artifacts
related to contouring the results from independent 2D inversions of
the 45 east-west lines, the paleochannel is clearly defined from
711 m depth, in good agreement with the well data. The 3D reflection data show generally enhanced reflectivity within the channel as
defined by the well data, although this reflectivity fades out between
about y = 30 and y = 40 m. In the north, all three images show the
channel curving to the east. This is where the strongest anomaly is in
the traveltime model, the deepest point is in the waveform surface,
and the largest patch of enhanced reflectivity is in the reflection image. South of about y = 80 m, the results are inconsistent. The lowvelocity anomaly disappears in the preferred traveltime model; the
channel defined by waveform inversion is generally consistent with
the well data, and the high reflectivity is shifted east of the channel as
defined by the well data. South of y = 80 m is an area where the alternative models show considerable variation see models 4 and 8,
Figure 11, d, i. This is not surprising, given the relatively poor resolution at the south end of the model Figure 8c.
The generally favorable comparison of the 3D velocity model
with the waveform and reflection results lends credibility to the interpretation of the north-south low-velocity anomaly being an expression of the topography on the clay surface and the low-velocity
sediments within the paleochannel. The waveform and reflection results have higher resolution than the traveltime result, as expected,
but all three methods image the channel structure in close agreement
with the well data. We estimate that the amount of experiment, computer, and human time necessary to produce the refraction model is a
factor of 510 less than the time to produce the other two results.

3D seismic refraction tomography

CONCLUSIONS
The 3D seismic refraction experiment at HAFB and the application of 3D first-arrival-time tomography were a feasibility study for
shallow seismic investigations at environmental remediation sites.
Imaging the velocity structure of the near-surface environment provides encouraging results, despite less-than-ideal seismic data resulting from airwave contamination, onsite noise from ongoing remediation activities, and a relatively low dominant frequency for
such a shallow target.
Regularized first-arrival-time tomography obtained a minimumstructure velocity model that outlines the shape of the low-velocity
fill in the paleochannel at the top of the clay formation. The northsouth low-velocity structure appears to mimic the paleochannel as
determined from over 100 wells, generally consistent with the results of waveform inversion and 3D poststack depth migration of the
reflection data. The low-velocity anomaly may represent the shape
of the paleochannel accurately at length scales of about 10 m, according to checkerboard tests and considering the Fresnel zones.
The results suggest that first-arrival traveltime tomography can
constrain the long-wavelength features of a rapidly changing, nearsurface heterogeneous environment. A higher center frequency in
the data would have meant smaller Fresnel zones and, along with a
better S/N ratio, a smaller picking error, which in turn would have
justified a closer fit to the data, increasing model resolution. In any
shallow seismic study, the center frequency is dictated by site conditions and the need to propagate energy to and from the target. In comparison to the 3D seismic reflection method, the seismic refraction
method was relatively simple, quick, and inexpensive. In addition,
the analysis and interpretation of refraction data is potentially less
subjective than conventional reflection processing. There is minimal
data processing and objective arrival picking, assuming low noise,
and solving for a minimum-structure model minimizes the subjectivity of the interpretation. Compared to waveform inversion, traveltime inversion is robust, even in the presence of considerable noise
or spatial aliasing. Finally, the velocity model obtained by first-arrival-time tomography can be used as a starting model for waveform
inversion and as an independent check on the images obtained from
processing reflection data.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Hans Meinardus of Duke Power acted as our liaison with HAFB,
and Jon Ginn at HAFB made possible our access to OU2. We thank
the volunteer field crew members from nine countries for their great
teamwork. D. Dana and I. Morozov helped to prepare the data for
analysis. G. Fradelizio and F. Gao provided figures from their work.
Comments by the associate editor J. Bradford and five anonymous
reviewers were very helpful. GMT Wessel and Smith, 1998 was
used to produce some of the figures. IRIS/PASSCAL provided the
seismic recording instruments and field support. This research was
funded by DOE grant DE-FG07-97ER14827.

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