The invention discloses an
underwater sound source direction estimating method, comprising the following steps of: mounting acoustic-
optical coupling interference type
fiber optic hydrophones on an overwater onboard platform, wherein all the acoustic-
optical coupling interference type
fiber optic hydrophones are arranged into a uniform round array; respectively vertically emitting probing light to a water surface by using each acoustic-
optical coupling interference type
fiber optic
hydrophone, and generating reference light simultaneously; respectively returning each path of the probing light to the original acoustic-optical
coupling interference type fiber optic
hydrophone after each path of the probing light is reflected by the water surface, and carrying out related
demodulation on the returned probing light through the acoustic-optical
coupling interference type fiber optic hydrophones, so as to obtain
underwater sound
source data; and using a beam forming
algorithm to process the
underwater sound
source data demodulated by each acoustic-optical
coupling interference type fiber optic
hydrophone, so as to estimate and obtain a direction of the underwater sound source. With the adoption of the underwater sound source direction estimating method provided by the invention, the rapid probing of a large-range sea area can be realized, and the full-direction
estimation of a
direction angle and a
pitch angle of the underwater sound source can be realized. The position of the fiber optic hydrophones on a sliding rail can be adjusted, so that a uniform round array can be applicable to positioning the underwater sound source with a wider
frequency band range.