Topic summary
Echo sounder

Extracted from the Wikipedia article Echo sounding.
Single beam
A single-beam echo sounder is one of the simplest and most fundamental types of underwater sonar. They are ubiquitous in the boating world and used on a number of different marine robotic vehicles. It operates by using a transducer to emit a pulse through the water and listen for echoes to return. Using that data, it's able to determine the distance from the strongest echo, which can be the seafloor, a concrete structure, or other larger obstacle. A fishfinder is an echo sounding device used by both recreational and commercial fishers.