Vincent G. Ambrosia

Unmanned Aircraft Systems in Remote Sensing and Scientific Research: Classification and Considerations of Use

Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) have evolved rapidly over the past decade driven primarily by military uses, and have begun finding application among civilian users for earth sensing reconnaissance and scientific data collection purposes. Among UAS, promising characteristics are long flight duration, improved mission safety, flight repeatability due to improving autopilots, and reduced operational costs when compared to manned aircraft. The potential advantages of an unmanned platform, however, depend on many factors, such as aircraft, sensor types, mission objectives, and the current UAS regulatory requirements for operations of the particular platform. The regulations concerning UAS operation are still in the early development stages and currently present significant barriers to entry for scientific users. In this article we describe a variety of platforms, as well as sensor capabilities, and identify advantages of each as relevant to the demands of users in the scientific research sector. We also briefly discuss the current state of regulations affecting UAS operations, with the purpose of informing the scientific community about this developing technology whose potential for revolutionizing natural science observations is similar to those transformations that GIS and GPS brought to the community two decades ago.

The Ikhana unmanned airborne system (UAS) western states fire imaging missions: from concept to reality (2006–2010)

Between 2006 and 2010, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the US Forest Service flew 14 unmanned airborne system (UAS) sensor missions, over 57 fires in the western US. The missions demonstrated the capabilities of a UAS platform (NASA Ikhana UAS), a multispectral sensor (autonomous modular sensor (AMS)), onboard processing and data visualization (Wildfire Collaborative Decision Environment (W-CDE)), to provide fire intelligence to management teams. Autonomous, on-board processing of the AMS sensor data allowed real-time fire product delivery to incident management teams on the wildfire events. The fire products included geo-rectified, colour-composite quick-look imagery, fire detection shape files, post-fire real-time normalized burn ratio imagery and burn area emergency response (BAER) imagery. The W-CDE was developed to allow the ingestion and visualization of AMS data and other pertinent fire-related information layers. This article highlights the technologies developed and employed, the UAS wildfire imaging missions performed and the outcomes and findings of the multi-year efforts.

Analysis of Forest Structure Using Thematic Mapper Simulator Data

Remotely sensed data from forested landscapes contain information on both cover type and structure. Structural properties include crown closure, basal area, leaf area index, and tree size. Cover type and structure together are useful variables for designing forest volume inventories. The potential of Thematic Mapper Simulator (TMS) data for sensing forest structure has been explored by principal components and feature selection techniques. Improved discrimination over multispectral scanner (MSS) data proved possible in a mixed conifer forest in Idaho for estimating crown closure and tree size (saplings/seedlings, pole, sawtimber). Classification accuracy increased monotonically with the addition of new channels up to seven; the four optimum channels were 4, 7, 5, and 3. The analysis of TMS data for 123 field sites in Sequoia National Park indicated that canopy closure could be well estimated by a variety of bands or band ratios (r = 0.62-0.69) without reference to forest type. Estimation of basal area was less successful ( r = 0.51 or less) on average, but improved for certain forest types when data were stratified by floristic composition. To achieve such a stratification, sites were ordinated by a detrended correspondence analysis (DECORANA) based on the canopy of dominant species. Within forest types, canopy closure continued to be the best predictor of spectral variation. Total basal area could be predicted in certain forest types with improved or moderate reliability using various linear ratios of TMS bands (e. g., red fir, 5/4, r = 0.76; lodgepole pine, 4/3, r = 0.82).

Thermal analysis of wildfires and effects on global ecosystem cycling

Abstract Biomass combustion plays an important role in the earths biogeochemical cycling. The monitoring of wildfires and their associated variables at global scales is feasible and can lead to predictions of the influence of combustion on biogeochemical cycling and tropospheric chemistry. Remote sensing data collected during the 1985 California (U.S.A.) wildfire season indicate that the information content of key thermal and infrared/thermal wave band channels centered at 11.5 μm, 3.8 μm, and 2.25 μm are invaluable for discriminating and calculating fire related variables. These variables include fire intensity, rate‐of‐spread, soil cooling recovery behind the fire front and plume structure. Coinciding Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) data provided information regarding temperature estimations and the movement of the smoke plume from one wildfire into the Los Angeles basin.

NASA Science Serving Society: Improving Capabilities for Fire Characterization to Effect Reduction in Disaster Losses

In 2007, the United States experienced one of the most severe fire seasons on record with 110,237 fires (wildfires, prescribed, and management fires) burning 12,899,948 acres of land [1]. The suppression and damage costs of those fires exceeded one-billion dollars (US). Fires have wide ranging implications for ecological composition, climatic impacts, soil stability, economic and personal loss. U.S. wildfire management agencies are tasked with coordinating and fighting these conflagrations from the ground and air, at great risk to those crews and personnel on the front lines. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Forest Service (USFS) have teamed to explore innovative capabilities for observations of fire events, with the goal to improve the temporal resolution and information content of remotely sensed information to effect a more rapid disaster decision process. New technologies, derived from NASA science capabilities, have been developed, demonstrated and are currently being implemented in the national fire management system. In 2007, the partnership demonstrated new airborne thermal and multispectral sensor systems, innovative Unmanned Airborne Vehicle (UAV) platform operations, and a real-time decision support system and integrated data elements to facilitate a rapid fire collaborative decision environment to be used by national managers, Incident Command Centers, and field personnel. These capabilities were demonstrated during the western US fire season in summer 2007, and further integrated into the wildfire management structure during the devastating southern California firestorms of late October, 2007. This paper details the wildfire multi-agency (NASA, USDA-FS, and NIFC) partnership, technology development, demonstration, real-life application, and capabilities infusion plan that occurred in 2007 during major wildfire events in the US. The capabilities for delivering real-time disaster- related information, and sharing such, unencumbered, among a distributed community, will and can have a significant impact in reducing the severity of both natural and man-made disasters, thereby reducing the potential for loss of ecosystems, resources, property, life and reducing management and suppression costs.

Recent Experiences with Operating UAS in the NAS

®UAS over wildland fires in the western United States. The mission plan required interaction with the FAA to ensure safe operations in the National Air Space (NAS) and concurrently meet science mission objectives . The mission plans called for access to large area of the western US NAS to image wildfires during the peak US wildfires season . Plans were developed to modify flight parameters preceding and during the missions to facilitate observations of emerging fi re events. The missions served to demonstrat e safe science data collections and operations in the NAS. Because of the large scale of the mission objectives and the recent creation of the FAA Unmanned Aircraft Program Office , interactions and mission criteria negotiations between the agencies continued through the final days of the western US fire season. Subsequently, we were unable to meet fire mission objectives in 2006, although we did operate two missions in the NAS at the close of the season. One missions involved an emergency COA application (and approval) to support the deadly Esperanza Fire in southern California with image “intelligence” data. That mission was flown over a 16.5 hour period on October 28/29, 200 7. With the successful demonstration of the platform operations in the NAS in late 2006, the mission plan and objectives were extended to the 2007 western US fire season. The 2007 mission plans and objectives remain intact and include 4 -5 missions in the NAS of 20+ hour duration capabilities. The missions are planned for mid -July extend ing through the end of August 2007. The 2007 mission series is planned for flight operations on the new NASA Ikhana (Predator B -derivative) UAS. This paper describes the 2006 experiences, and focus es on the mission planning efforts, logistics, and criteria necessary to facilitate approval from the FAA to safely perform this valuable scientific capabilities mission aboard a high -altitude UAS operating in the NAS during the summer of 2007.

High altitude aircraft remote sensing during the 1988 Yellowstone national park wildfires

An overview is presented of the effects of the wildfires that occurred in the Yellowstone National Park during 1988 and the techniques employed to combat these fires with the use of remote sensing. The fire management team utilized King-Air and Merlin aircraft flying night missions with a thermal IR line-scanning system. NASA-Ames Research Center assisted with an ER-2 high altitude aircraft with the ability to down-link active data from the aircraft via a teledetection system. The ER-2 was equipped with a multispectral Thematic Mapper Simulator scanner and the resultant map data and video imagery was provided to the fire command personnel for field evaluation and fire suppression activities. This type of information proved very valuable to the fire control management personnel and to the continuing ecological research goals of NASA-Ames scientists analyzing the effects of burn type and severity on ecosystem recovery and development.

Demonstrating of Real-Time Fire Monitoring Using UAVs

1 Copyright 2002 by The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. No copyright is asserted in the U.S. under Title 17, U.S. Code. The U.S. Government has a royalty-free license to exercise all rights under the copyright claimed herein for Governmental Purposes. All other rights are reserved by the copyright owner. ABSTRACT NASA-Ames Research Center, in collaboration with General Atomics Aeronautical Systems, Inc. has been developing real-time data acquisition and information delivery systems employing uninhabited aerial vehicle (UAV) technology for disaster mitigation and assessment demonstrations. Working in conjunction with the U.S. Forest Service, a disaster community agency responsible for wildfire management and mitigation, we developed a large-scale wildfire demonstration called the First Response Experiment (FiRE), which took place in late summer 2001. During that experiment, which had been in the planning for some time [1], the participants demonstrated the melding of innovative technologies such as UAV platforms, real-time data processing, and data telemetry for quick analysis of a disaster event. The General Atomics ALTUS UAV, the Airborne Infrared Disaster Assessment System (AIRDAS) and Over-The-Horizon (OTH) satellite data telemetry equipment were employed over a controlled burn to test the feasibility of a disaster monitoring platform for hazardous duty. ALTUS was employed to demonstrate the long duration, altitude, and payload capability of unmanned platforms for acquiring disaster related data.