Scientific Applications of Unmanned Vehicles in Svalbard (UAV Svalbard)

Hann, Richard; Altstädter, Barbara; Betlem, Peter; Deja, Kajetan; Dragańska‐Deja, Katarzyna; Ewertowski, Marek; Hartvich, Filip; Jonassen, Marius O.; Lampert, Astrid; Laska, Michał; Sobota, Ireneusz; Storvold, Rune; Wojtysiak, Kacper; Zagórski, Piotr

doi:10.5281/zenodo.4293283

Cited by 8 publications

(12 citation statements)

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“…pared to other devices (e.g. low cost, applicable to inaccessible areas; Hann et al, 2021), this study shows that UAVs provide a reliable and effective way of data gathering for aerodynamic roughness length estimation on glaciers. Nevertheless, the depth of the crevasses must be seen as a minimum depth, and the crevasses might penetrate further into the glacier than actually measured.…”

Section: Validation Of Digital Elevation Model Accuracymentioning

confidence: 71%

“…Method Surface type z 0 (m) Fitzpatrick et al (2019) Raster Large crevasses 0.01-0.5 Obleitner (2000) Transect Very rough glacier ice 0.05 Smeets et al (1999) Transect Very rough glacier ice 0.02-0.08 Smith et al (2016) Transect Deep crevasses 0.005-0.05 Smith et al (2016) Raster Deep crevasses 0.003-0.025 or drones, provide a cheap alternative to overcome these limitations (Uysal et al, 2015) because they are more flexible in their use and less limited by local topography as they provide a bird's-eye perspective. In recent years, UAVs have presented new opportunities for detailed mapping of the earth surface and have become more and more popular in the field of glaciology (Bhardwaj et al, 2016) and in Svalbard (Hann et al, 2021). The main advantage of UAVs is the possibility of collecting high-temporal-and high-spatial-resolution data at low costs (Casella and Franzini, 2016) and to overcome the gap between sparse field observations and coarse-resolution space-borne remote sensing data (Bhardwaj et al, 2016).…”

Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Aerodynamic roughness length of crevassed tidewater glaciers from UAV mapping

Dachauer

Hann²,

Hodson³

2021

The Cryosphere

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Abstract. The aerodynamic roughness length (z0) is an important parameter in the bulk approach for calculating turbulent fluxes and their contribution to ice melt. However, z0 estimates for heavily crevassed tidewater glaciers are rare or only generalised. This study used uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs) to map inaccessible tidewater glacier front areas. The high-resolution images were utilised in a structure-from-motion photogrammetry approach to build digital elevation models (DEMs). These DEMs were applied to five models (split across transect and raster methods) to estimate z0 values of the mapped area. The results point out that the range of z0 values across a crevassed glacier is large, by up to 3 orders of magnitude. The division of the mapped area into sub-grids (50 m × 50 m), each producing one z0 value, accounts for the high spatial variability in z0 across the glacier. The z0 estimates from the transect method are in general greater (up to 1 order of magnitude) than the raster method estimates. Furthermore, wind direction (values parallel to the ice flow direction are greater than perpendicular values) and the chosen sub-grid size turned out to have a large impact on the z0 values, again presenting a range of up to 1 order of magnitude each. On average, z0 values between 0.08 and 0.88 m for a down-glacier wind direction were found. The UAV approach proved to be an ideal tool to provide distributed z0 estimates of crevassed glaciers, which can be incorporated by models to improve the prediction of turbulent heat fluxes and ice melt rates.

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Section: Validation Of Digital Elevation Model Accuracymentioning

confidence: 71%

Section: Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Aerodynamic roughness length of crevassed tidewater glaciers from UAV mapping

Dachauer

Hann²,

Hodson³

2021

The Cryosphere

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“…The UAV used in this pilot study is a small quadcopter drone, with limited battery capacity and flying time. Using larger quadcopter drones or fixed-wing drones with a longer range is suggested to allow for larger area covered over which abundance can be estimated [44,62]. This, however, comes at larger cost and -in the case of fixed-wing drones -higher operation complexity, particularly in the Arctic.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Once the method is fully evaluated and developed it can be easily transferred to more complex UAV systems that compensate for the limited range and coverage (i.e., using fixed-wing UAVs). Practically, such surveys should be conducted with fixed-wing UAVs that have longer range and can cover larger areas [44].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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How Many Reindeer? UAV Surveys as an Alternative to Helicopter or Ground Surveys for Estimating Population Abundance in Open Landscapes

Paulsen¹,

Pedersen²,

Hann³

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Conservation of wildlife depends on precise and unbiased knowledge on the abundance and distribution of species. A challenge is to choose appropriate methods to obtain a sufficiently high detectability and spatial coverage matching the species characteristics and spatiotemporal use of the landscape. In remote areas, such as in the Arctic, monitoring efforts are often resource demanding and there is a need for cheap and precise alternative methods. Here, we compare an UAV pilot-survey to traditional population abundance surveys from ground and helicopter of the non-gregarious Svalbard reindeer to investigate whether small quadcopter UAVs can be an efficient alternative technology. We find that estimates of reindeer abundances from UAV imagery have lower precision and are more time consuming than present abundance surveys when used at management relevant spatial scales. We suggest that more efficient long-range fixed-wing UAVs should be evaluated for the job to increase the sampled area by UAV. In addition, the method will depend on the availability of more efficient post-processing methods including automatic animal object identification with machine learning and analytical methods that account for uncertainties.

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Accuracy of UAV-based DEMs without ground control points

Szypuła

2023

Geoinformatica

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Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are increasingly used in various environmental research projects and other activities that require accurate topography images. The quality of elevation models derived from UAV measurements varies depending on many variables (e.g. UAV equipment used, terrain conditions, etc.). In order to improve the quality of digital models based on UAV image data, additional GNSS-RTK measurements are usually made at ground control points. The aim of this article is to evaluate the mathematical accuracy of terrain models created without ground control points. The accuracy of the models is considered in two directions: vertical and horizontal. Vertical (elevation) accuracy is calculated based on airborne laser scanning (ALS) data and horizontal (location) accuracy is calculated through comparison with high-resolution orthophotomaps. The average elevation accuracy of all created UAV-based DEMs is found to be 2.7–2.8 m (MAE), 3.1–3.3 m (RMSE), and the average horizontal accuracy is 2.1 m. Despite the low accuracy of the UAV models, the topography is reflected very well in the spatial images. This may be related to the regular and symmetrical distribution of height errors. To improve the accuracy parameters of UAV-based DEMs, it is proposed that they be rapidly georeferenced based on orthophotomaps.

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Scientific Applications of Unmanned Vehicles in Svalbard (UAV Svalbard)

Cited by 8 publications

References 0 publications

Aerodynamic roughness length of crevassed tidewater glaciers from UAV mapping

Aerodynamic roughness length of crevassed tidewater glaciers from UAV mapping

How Many Reindeer? UAV Surveys as an Alternative to Helicopter or Ground Surveys for Estimating Population Abundance in Open Landscapes

Accuracy of UAV-based DEMs without ground control points

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