Airborne Videography and GPS for Assessment of Forest Damage in Southern Louisiana from Hurricane Andrew

"One week after Hurricane Andrew made landfall in Louisiana in August 1992, an airborne videography system, with a global positioning system (GPS) receiver, was used to assess timberland damage across a 1.7 million-ha (4.2 million-acre) study area. Ground observations were made to identify different intensities of timber damage and then cross-referenced with the aerial video using GPS coordinates. Flight lines were established at 160km (lo-mile) intervals perpendicular to the storms path.

"The nominal flight altitude of 600 m (2,000 feet) above ground level and a 550mm focal-length camera lens resulted in a ground swath averaging 92 m (300 feet) in width. Video frames were captured digitally from the 8-mm analog videocassette at 800-m (half-mile) intervals along each flight path. Each video frame was interpreted for timber damage and placed into one of four arbitrary

categories of bole-volume damage. The video frame locations were grouped into relative damage-zone polygons in a geographic ‘ information system (GIS). The polygons were then used to retrieve forest inventory plot information by damage zone and to estimate volumes of damaged timber." [Abstract]

[University Park, PA, on June 21-24, 1993]

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