What would a buried radio transmitter sound like?

Question

I'm writing a story that involves searching for a missing spaceship.  The ship in question got buried in river silt during a seasonal flood.  However, it's intact, everything is in working order, and it has some power, enough that its emergency radio beacon is operating.

What would that sound like to a searching craft with a radio receiver?  Would the content of the message be intact, somewhat garbled, or just static?  How about directionality... would searchers have a harder time triangulating the location?  How much would the power of the transmission be diminished?

Thanks in advance!

afthefragile · Accepted Answer

Radio waves travel through water and can reach some depth into land too.

If the radio signal is operating and is transmitting radio waves, the waves aren't gonna get influenced by the surroundings.
They might get weakened due to being worried in the ground and under water but the actual message won't change.

The weak wave might be harder to pick up resulting in static and such.
But the message (or the sound or whatever the message holds) won't change.

DJ STRANE · Answer

be careful because the signal will be fine but an emergency radio beacon does not actually send like a message it just send a continuous radio signal on a different sort of frequency that can be picked up by emergency responders and transceivers

? · Answer

i would asume there would be alot of static or no message at all cause of water damage.

What would a buried radio transmitter sound like?

3 Answers