When a powerful and deadly hurricane makes landfall
somewhere, geospatial data can be very useful. In 2005, a category five
hurricane known as Katrina made landfall in New Orleans and affected much of
the infrastructure and people in the city. Lidar data has been used to
determine the land surface elevation of a place and was used in Louisiana in
2002 after an oil spill. As a result it was available three years later and
provided high-resolution elevation data for New Orleans after Katrina made landfall
and was extremely helpful in how people would respond to its aftermath. The lidar
data was needed in order to determine the magnitude of flood waters in specific
areas around the city. It allowed people
to make estimates of the floodwater volume as well which were needed so that
people could anticipate the amount of time it would take to get rid of the
floodwater in the city. People were more knowledgeable on how to respond to a
flooded area with this data information. In addition, people can use this
information to determine how flooding might impact an urban environment. This
data will also be helpful to people when planning on building infrastructure or
reconstructing so they can be more ready for these types of disasters in the
future.
Gesch, D. (2005). Topography-based analysis of Hurricane
Katrina inundation of New Orleans.
Science and the storms: The USGS Response
to the Hurricanes of.
hey nice post. haha
ReplyDeleteThis is a great application for the technology, but I have to wonder how much relief efforts were actually based on this kind of information as opposed to information about demography, race, income levels, etc. Was there possibly a hierarchy among the most inundated areas based on who the government and aid organzations felt deserved help first?
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