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At least 73 records · Page 4
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Systemic Risk From the Perspective of Climate, Environmental and Disaster Risk Science and Practice

Understanding and managing systemic risk is more important than ever due to our immense global connectivity (e.g., between sectors, such as food-health-water-energy, countries and continents, down to individuals). Despite the fact that the notion of systemic risk is several decades old, the term is used in diverse ways across different disciplines (e.g., financial systems, medicine, earth system sciences, disaster risk research and climate science). Triggered by the repercussions of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic, which are clear realization of systemic risk, the perception of systemic risk has often been focused on global and catastrophic or even existential risks. Systemic risk, however, can be seen as a feature of systems at all possible scales (e.g., global, national, regional, local) with system boundaries varying depending on the context. Addressing current societal challenges, such as climate change, in terms of systemic risk requires integrating different systems perspectives and fostering system thinking, while implementing key intergovernmental agendas, such as the Paris Agreement, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction and the Sustainable Development Goals. Based on insights gained and knowledge collected from an expert workshop, literature review and expert elicitation, we give an integrated perspective of climate, environmental and disaster risk science and practice on systemic risk as summarized in a Briefing Note to the International Science Council. We provide an overview of concepts of systemic risk that have evolved over time and identify commonalities across terminologies and perspectives associated with systemic risk used in different contexts. Key attributes of systemic risk are outlined without prescribing a single definition, and information and data requirements are discussed that are essential for a better and more actionable understanding of the systemic nature of risk. Finally, the opportunities to connect research and policy for addressing systemic risk are highlighted.

systemic risk↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

The NASA Disasters Response Coordination System’s (DRCS) Response to the 2024 Hurricane Season

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Disasters Response Coordination System (DRCS) leverages the best available science and expertise to aid federal, state, local, and non-governmental organization (NGO) partners in addressing identified needs during a disaster response. During the 2024 hurricane season, the DRCS activated for seven hurricanes/tropical storms, providing openly available geospatial data through NASA’s Disasters Mapping Portal. Hurricanes Helene and Milton were major hurricanes that impacted the southeastern United States within weeks of one another. Impacts from Helene and Milton to the region included inland flooding, record coastal storm surge, over a thousand landslides, and regional power and telecommunications outages. In response to Helene and Milton, DRCS provided actionable information and products to stakeholders, including Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) analysis for landslide and flood detection, Black Marble nighttime lights products for assessing power outages, and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) analysis for post-event vegetation change detection. NASA deployed an Uninhibited Aerial Vehicle SAR (UAVSAR) instrument to collect data on flood extent, providing crucial information on affected communities. Additionally, astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) collected hand-held photography along the paths of Hurricane Helene and Milton to aid in response efforts. Here, we summarize the DRCS responses to Helene and Milton, in particular highlighting the information and products that were provided by the DRCS and how they were utilized by partners to address immediate response needs.

Earth observations↗
NASA NTRS1971

Disaster warning satellite study

The Disaster Warning Satellite System is described. It will provide NOAA with an independent, mass communication system for the purpose of warning the public of impending disaster and issuing bulletins for corrective action to protect lives and property. The system consists of three major segments. The first segment is the network of state or regional offices that communicate with the central ground station; the second segment is the satellite that relays information from ground stations to home receivers; the third segment is composed of the home receivers that receive information from the satellite and provide an audio output to the public. The ground stations required in this system are linked together by two, separate, voice bandwidth communication channels on the Disaster Warning Satellites so that a communications link would be available in the event of disruption of land line service.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS1974

Remote sensing utility in a disaster struck urban environment

A project to determine the ways in which remote sensing can contribute to solutions of urban public health problems in time of natural disaster is discussed. The objectives of the project are to determine and describe remote sensing standard operating procedures for public health assistance during disaster relief operations which will aid the agencies and organizations involved in disaster intervention. Proposed tests to determine the validity of the remote sensing system are reported.

Rush, M.↗
NASA NTRS1974

Disaster warning system: Satellite feasibility and comparison with terrestrial systems. Volume 1: Executive summary

The Disaster Warning System (DWS) is a conceptual system which will provide the National Weather Service (NWS) with communication services in the 1980s to help minimize losses caused by natural disasters. The object of this study is a comparative analysis between a terrestrial DWS and a satellite DWS. Baseline systems satisfying the NOAA requirements were synthesized in sufficient detail so that a comparison could be made in terms of performance and cost. The cost of both baseline systems is dominated by the disaster warning and spotter reporting functions. An effort was undertaken to reduce system cost through lower-capacity alternative systems generated by modifying the baseline systems. By reducing the number of required channels and modifying the spotter reporting techniques, alternative satellite systems were synthesized. A terrestrial alternative with the coverage reduced to an estimated 95 percent of the population was considered.

Spoor, J. H.↗
NASA NTRS2002

Laser Prevention of Earth Impact Disasters

Today we are seeing the geological data base constantly expanding as new evidence from past impacts with the Earth are discovered and investigated. It is now commonly believed that a hypervelocity impact occurring approximately 65 million years ago in the Yucatan Peninsula area was the disaster responsible for the extinction of almost 70% of the species of life on Earth including of course the dinosaurs. What is sobering is that we believe now that this was just one of several such disasters and that some of the others caused extinctions to even a greater extent. Preventing collisions with the Earth by hypervelocity asteroids, meteoroids, and comets is the most important problem facing human civilization. While there are many global problems facing our planet including overpopulation, pollution, disease, and deforestation; none of these offer the potential of rapid, total extinction. Rapid is the operative word here in that many of the global problems we face may indeed, if not sufficiently addressed, pose a similar long-term threat. However, with the impact threat, a single, almost unpredictable event could lead to a chain reaction of disasters that would end everything mankind has worked to achieve over the centuries. Our chances of being hit are greater than our chance of winning the lottery. We now believe that while there are only about 2000-earth orbit crossing rocks great than 1 kilometer in diameter, there may be as many as 100,000 rocks in the 100 m size range. The 1 kilometer rocks are difficult to detect and even harder to track. The 100 m class ones are almost impossible to find with today's technology. Can anything be done about this fundamental existence question facing us? The answer is a resounding yes. By using an intelligent combination of Earth and space based sensors coupled with high-energy laser stations in orbit, we can deflect rocks from striking the Earth. This is accomplished by irradiating the surface of the rock with sufficiently intense pulses so that ablation occurs. This ablation acts as a small rocket incrementally changing the shape of the rock's orbit around the Sun.

Campbell, Jonathan W.↗
NASA NTRS2013

Near Real-Time Applications of Earth Remote Sensing for Response to Meteorological Disasters

Numerous on‐orbit satellites provide a wide range of spatial, spectral, and temporal resolutions supporting the use of their resulting imagery in assessments of disasters that are meteorological in nature. This presentation will provide an overview of recent use of Earth remote sensing by NASA's Short‐term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center in response to disaster activities in 2012 and 2013, along with case studies supporting ongoing research and development. The SPoRT Center, with support from NASA's Applied Sciences Program, has explored a variety of new applications of Earth‐observing sensors to support disaster response. In May 2013, the SPoRT Center developed unique power outage composites representing the first clear sky view of damage inflicted upon Moore and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma following the devastating EF‐5 tornado that occurred on May 20. Subsequent ASTER, MODIS, Landsat‐7 and Landsat‐8 imagery help to identify the damaged area. Higher resolution imagery of Moore, Oklahoma were provided by commercial satellites and the recently available International Space Station (ISS) SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV) instrument. New techniques are being explored by the SPoRT team in order to better identify damage visible in high resolution imagery, and to monitor ongoing recovery for Moore, Oklahoma. Other applications are being developed to refine light source detections with the VIIRS day‐night band and to map hail during the growing season through combination of available satellite and radar imagery. The aforementioned products and support are not useful unless they are distributed in a timely manner and within an appropriate decision support system. This presentation will provide an update on ongoing activities to support inclusion of these data sets within the NOAA National Weather Service Damage Assessment Toolkit, which allows meteorologists in the field to consult available satellite imagery while performing their damage assessment.

Molthan, Andrew L.↗
NASA NTRS2013

Near Real-­Time Applications of Earth Remote Sensing for Response to Meteorological Disasters

Numerous on‐orbit satellites provide a wide range of spatial, spectral, and temporal resolutions supporting the use of their resulting imagery in assessments of disasters that are meteorological in nature. This presentation will provide an overview of recent use of Earth remote sensing by NASA's Short‐term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center in response to disaster activities in 2012 and 2013, along with case studies supporting ongoing research and development. The SPoRT Center, with support from NASA's Applied Sciences Program, has explored a variety of new applications of Earth‐observing sensors to support disaster response. In May 2013, the SPoRT Center developed unique power outage composites representing the first clear sky view of damage inflicted upon Moore and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma following the devastating EF‐5 tornado that occurred on May 20. Subsequent ASTER, MODIS, Landsat‐7 and Landsat‐8 imagery help to identify the damaged area. Higher resolution imagery of Moore, Oklahoma were provided by commercial satellites and the recently available International Space Station (ISS) SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV) instrument. New techniques are being explored by the SPoRT team in order to better identify damage visible in high resolution imagery, and to monitor ongoing recovery for Moore, Oklahoma. Other applications are being developed to refine light source detections with the VIIRS day‐night band and to map hail during the growing season through combination of available satellite and radar imagery. The aforementioned products and support are not useful unless they are distributed in a timely manner and within an appropriate decision support system. This presentation will provide an update on ongoing activities to support inclusion of these data sets within the NOAA National Weather Service Damage Assessment Toolkit, which allows meteorologists in the field to consult available satellite imagery while performing their damage assessment.

Molthan, Andrew L.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Applications of Satellite Remote Sensing for Response to and Recovery from Meteorological Disasters

Numerous on‐orbit satellites provide a wide range of spatial, spectral, and temporal resolutions supporting the use of their resulting imagery in assessments of disasters that are meteorological in nature. This presentation will provide an overview of recent use of Earth remote sensing by NASA's Short‐term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center in response to disaster activities in 2012 and 2013, along with case studies supporting ongoing research and development. The SPoRT Center, with support from NASA's Applied Sciences Program, has explored a variety of new applications of Earth‐observing sensors to support disaster response. In May 2013, the SPoRT Center developed unique power outage composites representing the first clear sky view of damage inflicted upon Moore and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma following the devastating EF‐5 tornado that occurred on May 20. Subsequent ASTER, MODIS, Landsat‐7 and Landsat‐8 imagery help to identify the damaged areas. Higher resolution imagery of Moore, Oklahoma were provided by commercial satellites and the recently available International Space Station (ISS) SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV) instrument. New techniques are being explored by the SPoRT team in order to better identify damage visible in high resolution imagery, and to monitor ongoing recovery for Moore, Oklahoma. This presentation will provide an overview of near real‐time data products developed for dissemination to SPoRT's partners in NOAA's National Weather Service, through collaboration with the USGS and other federal agencies. Specifically, it will focus on integration of various data sets within the NOAA National Weather Service Damage Assessment Toolkit, which allows meteorologists in the field to consult available satellite imagery while performing their damage assessment.

Molthan, Andrew I.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Applications of Satellite Remote Sensing for Response to and Recovery from Meteorological Disasters

Numerous on‐orbit satellites provide a wide range of spatial, spectral, and temporal resolutions supporting the use of their resulting imagery in assessments of disasters that are meteorological in nature. This presentation will provide an overview of recent use of Earth remote sensing by NASA's Short‐term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center in response to disaster activities in 2012 and 2013, along with case studies supporting ongoing research and development. The SPoRT Center, with support from NASA's Applied Sciences Program, has explored a variety of new applications of Earth‐observing sensors to support disaster response. In May 2013, the SPoRT Center developed unique power outage composites representing the first clear sky view of damage inflicted upon Moore and Oklahoma City, Oklahoma following the devastating EF‐5 tornado that occurred on May 20. Subsequent ASTER, MODIS, Landsat‐7 and Landsat‐8 imagery help to identify the damaged areas. Higher resolution imagery of Moore, Oklahoma were provided by commercial satellites and the recently available International Space Station (ISS) SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV) instrument. New techniques are being explored by the SPoRT team in order to better identify damage visible in high resolution imagery, and to monitor ongoing recovery for Moore, Oklahoma. This presentation will provide an overview of near real‐time data products developed for dissemination to SPoRT's partners in NOAA's National Weather Service, through collaboration with the USGS and other federal agencies. Specifically, it will focus on integration of various data sets within the NOAA National Weather Service Damage Assessment Toolkit, which allows meteorologists in the field to consult available satellite imagery while performing their damage assessment.

Molthan, Andrew L.↗
NASA NTRS2014

Use of NASA Near Real-Time and Archived Satellite Data to Support Disaster Assessment

NASA's Short‐term Prediction Research and Transition (SPoRT) Center partners with the NWS to provide near realtime data in support of a variety of weather applications, including disasters. SPoRT supports NASA's Applied Sciences Program: Disasters focus area by developing techniques that will aid the disaster monitoring, response, and assessment communities. SPoRT has explored a variety of techniques for utilizing archived and near real‐time NASA satellite data. An increasing number of end‐users - such as the NWS Damage Assessment Toolkit (DAT) - access geospatial data via a Web Mapping Service (WMS). SPoRT has begun developing open‐standard Geographic Information Systems (GIS) data sets via WMS to respond to end‐user needs.

McGrath, Kevin M.↗
NASA NTRS2013

Onboard Radar Processor Development for Disaster Response

Natural hazards often result in significant loss of human lives, economic assets and productivity as well as significant damage to the ecosystem. Scientists have reported more frequent and intense natural disasters in recent years, which may well be attributed to climate change. Many of the disaster response efforts were hampered by lack of up-to-date knowledge of the state of the affected areas because damaged infrastructure rendered the areas inaccessible. Radar remote sensing is playing an increasingly critical role in providing timely information to disaster response agencies due to the increasing fidelity and availability of geospatial information products.

VV (vertical transmit and vertical receive)↗
NASA NTRS2016

The EOSDIS Products Usability for Disaster Response

The focus of the study is to categorize both NRT and standard data products based on applicability to the SDR-defined disaster types. This will identify which datasets from current NASA satellite missions instruments are best suited for disaster response. The distribution metrics of the products that have been used for studying various selected disasters that have occurred over last 5 years will be analyzed that include volume, number of files, number of users, user domains, user country, etc. This data usage analysis will provide information to the data centers staff that can help them develop the functionality and allocate the resources needed for enhanced access and timely availability of the data products that are critical for the time-sensitive analyses.

LANCE↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Building Capacity to Use Earth Observations for Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience Applications: A Summary of NASA’s DEVELOP Program and Projects in Central and South America

NASA’s DEVELOP program engages individuals and organizations in 10-week feasibility studies to apply NASA Earth observations (EO) to decision makers’ needs. Since 2018, DEVELOP conducted 21 projects in Central and South America, eight of those in collaboration with Sistema de la Integración Centroamericana (SICA) and its member state partner agencies. These projects addressed a diverse set of community needs across multiple themes, including two focused on disaster risk reduction and resilience using EO for mapping landslide susceptibility in the Dominican Republic and riparian flooding in Guatemala and El Salvador. This poster introduces DEVELOP, its approach to capacity building, key partnerships, and project results highlighting the capabilities of EO for enhanced decision making in the area of reduction of disaster risk and support disaster resilience.

Capacity Building↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Dissemination of Global Flood Information Through Nasa Disasters Program Global Initiative for Flood Forecasting and Alerting (GIFFT)

The Global Initiative for Flood Forecasting and Alerting (GIFFT) is an initiative to disseminate flood products from different sensors to global stakeholders via the Pacific Disaster Center’s (PDC) DisasterAWARE®, the NASA Disasters Mapping Portal and potentially other mechanisms. GIFFT will also generate an integrated product(s) using ensembled hydrologic models and Earth observation derived flood outputs to stakeholders globally. This initiative combines the results of several Disasters Program funded projects that focus on flood forecasting, flood severity estimation, post-event flood mapping, flooddepth estimation and resulting flood severity using remote sensing-based flood information derived from SAR and optical imagery. PDC’s DisasterAWARE platform is a global multi-hazard alerting platform that currently incorporatesModel of Models (MoM) outputs as flood “incidents,” visually depicting potential floods in the context ofpopulation and infrastructure that may become affected. Automated procedures are being developed tocategorize MoM outputs as DisasterAWARE “hazards,” allowing for their dissemination to users alongwith other flood products that assess potential impacts. PDC’s stakeholders include UN, DoD, FEMA andtheir equivalents around the world. Additionally, the DisasterALERT mobile platform has 2 million usersworldwide and is a fully functional and sustained platform used to disseminate alerts and analyticalproducts for 18 different hazard types. GIFFT has incorporated HydroSAR products that will bedistributed via DisasterAWARE.

remote sensing↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

(ODIN): An Open Source, Low-Latency Data Integration & Visualization Framework for the NASA System Wide Safety Project's Disaster Response Safety Demonstration Series

The Open Data Integration Framework (ODIN) is an open source, low latency data integration and visualization framework (https://github.com/NASARace/race-odin) developed under NASA’s System WideSafety Program to demonstrate new safety capabilities designed to improve US airspace operations. Safety demonstrations are a set of increasingly complex (from public safety perspective) disaster response scenarios under which air systems must operate with increased capacity and include: 1) Wildland fire response, 2) Hurricane relief and recovery, 4) Emergency medical delivery via UAS and 4) Urban disaster relief. To accommodate disaster response, ODIN is field deployable and can scale on one or more multi-core, commodity laptops operating with full to limited or intermittent internet connectivity, conditions likely encountered during operations. ODIN runs as webserver with local, persistent data storage to serve either public or a secured, ad hoc network (e.g., an incident command post). The current released ODIN, ODIN-Fire is tailored for wildland fire management incorporating information on satellite overpasses with links to the near real-time data and imagery from the respective agencies. Included are winds data, an important variable for emergency responders and airspace operations, and high-resolution wind forecasts generated by super-computing resources and ingested into ODIN. As an open-source project, ODIN has attracted interest from multiple entities. We will show how 1) a commercial field instrument and data provider uses ODIN to help users visualize, publish and integrate their in-situ sensor network data and 2) ODIN’s capabilities to ingest, integrate and display near-real time satellite data with air traffic and a USFS winds forecast model used in fire response and post-fire assessment. Within NASA ODIN demonstrated novel, near terminal airspace safety capabilities for a project close-out event and previously it monitored the national airspace in real-time to meet an agency milestone. ODIN is presently under development for the anticipated hurricane relief and response demonstration notionally scheduled for the 2025-27 time frame and is available from NASA's github at the above link.

Aeronautics↗
NASA NTRS2014

A Cloud-Based Global Flood Disaster Community Cyber-Infrastructure: Development and Demonstration

Flood disasters have significant impacts on the development of communities globally. This study describes a public cloud-based flood cyber-infrastructure (CyberFlood) that collects, organizes, visualizes, and manages several global flood databases for authorities and the public in real-time, providing location-based eventful visualization as well as statistical analysis and graphing capabilities. In order to expand and update the existing flood inventory, a crowdsourcing data collection methodology is employed for the public with smartphones or Internet to report new flood events, which is also intended to engage citizen-scientists so that they may become motivated and educated about the latest developments in satellite remote sensing and hydrologic modeling technologies. Our shared vision is to better serve the global water community with comprehensive flood information, aided by the state-of-the- art cloud computing and crowdsourcing technology. The CyberFlood presents an opportunity to eventually modernize the existing paradigm used to collect, manage, analyze, and visualize water-related disasters.

CyberFlood↗