VSP-based surface-seismic multiple suppression

During conventional processing of surface seismic reflection data, both statistical deconvolution and common midpoint (CMP) stacking with normal (NMO) corrections contribute to the suppression of multiple activity. Statistical deconvolution is limited to short operators of a few hundred milliseconds, and therefore collapses only short-path multiples. The NMO stack attenuates low-velocity multiples by exploiting their greater moveout with respect to the primary reflections. Neither process addresses the removal of long-path, high-velocity multiples. Thus, the two modes of multiple suppression are not fully complementary; a subset of the multiple activity falls beyond the reach of bath, and survives to contaminate the final image.