FSU Researchers Turn to Satellite Imagery, Remote Sensing to Find "Debris Storm" Hot-Spots
By comparing satellite imagery before and after storms, the team hopes to develop a tool for predicting where help will be needed.
A team of researchers at the Florida State University has published a paper into remote sensing approaches to damage assessment for historical storms and hurricanes — as a means of predicting where the worst transit-blocking debris will be found after tropical cyclones.
"This research is especially relevant as hurricane season approaches because it reminds us that we need a variety of tools to properly respond to these storms," said Eren Ozguven, Resilient Infrastructure and Disaster Response (RIDER) Center director and senior author of the paper. "This paper describes an important tool and applies it to disasters in the Florida Panhandle."
The team took historical satellite imagery of Bay County, Florida, before and after two tropical storms and three hurricanes — including 2018's devastating Hurricane Michael. By analyzing the amount of vegetation visible in the imagery, the team was able to find correlations between wind speed, initial amount of vegetation, roadway density, and blocking debris following the storm.
Unsurprisingly, the team found the heaviest debris in suburban and urban areas with high concentrations of people and roads, with fewer problems in rural areas. With the correlations in hand, the team's next step is the development of a tool which will generate debris storm estimations ahead of time — providing hints as to where help will be needed to clear roadways and allow emergency response crews access to the regions hit by storms.
"The faster you can get debris off the roadway, the better you will be in terms of getting back to normal after a hurricane hits," explains co-author Tarek Abichou, professor of civil and environmental engineering. "Engineering is all about finding solutions despite obstacles, and hurricanes throw up all sorts of obstacles. Improving our ability to use remote sensing to prepare for and recover from storms will help us overcome those challenges."
The team's work has been published in the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction under closed-access terms.