Monitoring of Natural Disasters by Using the Visualization Technique of Remotely Sensed Data

Abstract

Monitoring of natural disasters by using the visualization technique of remotely sensed data is described. Oil spill detection in Japan Sea by RADARSAT SAR data which occurred in last January is mainly discussed. The pattern of oil spill could be detected as a dark area in the SAR image, since the radar back scattering from sea surface was suppressed due to the smoothing effect of spilled oil. It became clear that the detection of oil spill was difficult under the stormy weather condition such as winter season of Japan Sea, since the condition of oil spill detection was closely related to wind speed and wave height. In order to monitor natural disasters, it is important to observe disasters quickly and frequently. Visualization technique is also important to compute physical parameters from images.