NEHRP Clearinghouse
- Title
- Natural-Color Image Mosaics of Afghanistan: Digital Databases and Maps.
- File
- PB2008100450.pdf
- Author(s)
- Davis, P. A.; Hare, T. M.
- Source
- January 2007, 10 p.
- Identifying Number(s)
- USGS-DS-245
- Abstract
- In 2005, the U.S. Agency for International Development and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency contracted with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to perform assessments of the natural resources within Afghanistan. The assessments concentrated on resources related to the economic development of the country, specifically oil and gas, coal, minerals, and water, as well as on earthquake hazards. All of these assessments require geologic, structural, and topographic information throughout the country at a finer scale and with better accuracy than those provided by existing maps, which were published in the 1970s by the Russians and Germans. The very rugged terrain, the large scale of these assessments, and the terrorist threat in Afghanistan indicated that the best approach to provide the preliminary assessments was to use remotely sensed, satellite image data, although this may also apply to subsequent phases of the assessments. Therefore, the first step in the assessment process was to produce satellite image mosaics of Afghanistan. This report discusses the production of two digital natural-color satellite image databases, as well as various versions of a countrywide, natural-color map.
- Keywords
- ; Afghanistan; Natural resources; Databases; Maps; US AID; Satellite imagery; Remote sensing; Landsat images; USGS; Digital maps; Imaging spectrometers; Geomorphology