A Sensor Fusion Approach to Coastal Mapping

NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey (NGS) is responsible for mapping the national shoreline. This shoreline provides the critical baseline for demarcating the United States’ marine territorial limits, including its Exclusive Economic Zone; and is used in updating NOAA nautical charts and management of coastal resourses. NGS conducted a data fusion research project in collaboration with the Joint Airborne Lidar Bathymetric Technical Center of Expertise (JALBTCX) and other NOAA partners. In March and April of 2004, hyperspectral imagery, topographic lidar data, and highresolution digital color imagery were collected simultaneously aboard the NOAA Citation for coastal project areas in Florida and California. The data are being used to support a number of research objectives, including shoreline extraction and feature attribution, and coral reef mapping. The details of the simultaneous data acquisition with three different sensors are presented along with preliminary results from our shoreline mapping research