Abstract: A multiple signal classification algorithm based on the continuous wavelet transform(CWT_MUSIC) is proposed to estimate the Direction Of Arrival(DOA) of the transient signal. Firstly, the scale parameter of the wavelet is determined according to the signal characteristics, and the transient signals is processed using the Morlet wavelet transform constructed by those scale parameters. The wavelet coefficients are used to establish a multi-resolution timefrequency array signal model that is introduced into the MUSIC algorithm to perform DOA estimation of the transient signal. Secondly, the multi-resolution and error performance of this algorithm are analyzed. Finally, some simulations and outfield explosion experiments are conducted. Both results showed that the proposed CWT_MUSIC algorithm can improve the spatial spectral resolution and the DOA estimation performance.