Cultural heritage sites in danger-towards automatic damage detection from space
Journal
Remote Sensing
Date Issued
September 21, 2016
DOI
10.3390/rs8090781
Abstract
The intentional damage to local Cultural Heritage sites carried out in recent months by the
Islamic State have received wide coverage from the media worldwide. Earth Observation data provide
important information to assess this damage in such non-accessible areas, and automated image
processing techniques will be needed to speed up the analysis if a fast response is desired. This paper
shows the first results of applying fast and robust change detection techniques to sensitive areas,
based on the extraction of textural information and robust differences of brightness values related to
pre- and post-disaster satellite images. A map highlighting potentially damaged buildings is derived,
which could help experts at timely assessing the damages to the Cultural Heritage sites of interest.
Encouraging results are obtained for two archaeological sites in Syria and Iraq.
Islamic State have received wide coverage from the media worldwide. Earth Observation data provide
important information to assess this damage in such non-accessible areas, and automated image
processing techniques will be needed to speed up the analysis if a fast response is desired. This paper
shows the first results of applying fast and robust change detection techniques to sensitive areas,
based on the extraction of textural information and robust differences of brightness values related to
pre- and post-disaster satellite images. A map highlighting potentially damaged buildings is derived,
which could help experts at timely assessing the damages to the Cultural Heritage sites of interest.
Encouraging results are obtained for two archaeological sites in Syria and Iraq.
File(s)![Thumbnail Image]()
Name
Lyasandrou.pdf
Size
16.1 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
f29ee5a166860b7b63d9e6023e1dff49