Small Business Innovation Research/Small Business Tech Transfer
An Interoperable Decision Support System for Flood Disaster Response Assistance
Project Description
There is a plethora of remotely sensed information and geospatial data (from models, OpenStreetMap, etc.) available to describe and quantify the processes, magnitude, frequency and impacts of floods. Ongoing NASA (and other space agencies e.g. ESA, ISA, JAXA) missions provide an enormous volume of free data that can deliver information at the appropriate temporal and spatial resolution for flood disaster management and emergency response spanning the natural process of a flood event from "clouds to inundation" or "mitigation to response". However, information is under-utilized by response teams, mostly because of its relative novelty and unintuitive access: (1)difficulties in obtaining information within the timeframe for mitigation, preparedness, response/recovery, (2)confusion as to the most appropriate data assets for a flood situation, (3)limited time and personnel capacity to process and handle new types of datasets; (4)limited bandwidth for large file sharing capacity in deep-field environments (5)incompatibility between user mapping platforms and geospatial data formats; (6)data availability may be simply unknown and/or data latency may be inadequate; and (5) limited understanding by scientists and engineers about end user operational requirements. This problem was discussed by emergency, science academic, and private sector experts during a workshop on "Flood Response" in June 2016. The top priority action item agreed upon was the need to build a "one-stop-shop" online GUI that was built on OGC standards and had a number of end-user guided "wish items", such as depicting and predicting extent and location of impact area for data acquisition tasking.In order to address these needs, we propose to deliver flood-related NASA and other geospatial data layers to flood emergency managers and responders in an easily accessible format using an online Decision Support System that will integrate with end-user operation systems and provide relevant, timely information.
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Anticipated Benefits
NASA's Earth Science infrastructure exists in a landscape of data systems that contain valuable remotely sensed analysis and modeled information. RSS, Inc. is part of a number of ongoing NASA projects in which satellite data and model simulations of flood event processes are converted into accessible user-friendly formats. This is in accordance with NASA's Applied Science Program to support its contributions to Action 2 of the National Plan for Civil Earth Observations to "Improve Data Access, Management, and Interoperability". In this proposal, RSS would augment current efforts by including the newly launched GPM and SMAP data layers from NASA data centers into the proposed decision support system, thereby enhancing ongoing NASA ROSES project deliverables that plan to make NASA MODIS and Landsat flood maps and global flood model simulations easily accessible through data distribution platforms, such as the Dartmouth Flood Observatory and Google's Earth Engine. Such data layers will provide a seamless overlay and create a multi-layer flood event hazard chain ranging from a flood driver layer (GPM) through flood onset layers (SMAP) to flood event hazard layers (from NRT MODIS combined with flood model maps) and flood predictions (UMD's Global Flood Monitoring System). This SBIR DSS project would also use mature technologies that leverage current NASA data system capabilities thereby increasing the efficiency for decision-makers and enabling new users to benefit from EO data.
Non-NASA applications are numerous. It is anticipated that the proposed DSS for flood disasters will be used by national and international agencies, development aid organizations, local and regional authorities as well as scientists and academics. To this end, we will work with a number of different decision-makers from the onset of Phase I. Most of the selected end-users (FEMA, USGS, NGA, DFO, UMD, StormCenter Communications Inc., CSR, JPL, World Bank, UN WFP, CEOS, LIST, LA DOT) were participants of the June Flood Response workshop (organized by PI Dr. Schumann). At the workshop, this new Community of Practice agreed to collaborate and support ongoing as well as newly proposed flood response activities and efforts such as the DSS proposed here. This "collective awareness" of needs, challenges and requirements will form the basis of the design, development and implementation of the proposed DSS. The team also expects this system to be used by scientists and academics active in flood science and hydrology in general. The proposed "one-stop-shop" for flood disaster response will ingest data from many non-NASA operational and research organizations such as USGS, NOAA, ECMWF, JRC and other space agencies, that are active in flood mapping, modeling and forecasting. More »
Non-NASA applications are numerous. It is anticipated that the proposed DSS for flood disasters will be used by national and international agencies, development aid organizations, local and regional authorities as well as scientists and academics. To this end, we will work with a number of different decision-makers from the onset of Phase I. Most of the selected end-users (FEMA, USGS, NGA, DFO, UMD, StormCenter Communications Inc., CSR, JPL, World Bank, UN WFP, CEOS, LIST, LA DOT) were participants of the June Flood Response workshop (organized by PI Dr. Schumann). At the workshop, this new Community of Practice agreed to collaborate and support ongoing as well as newly proposed flood response activities and efforts such as the DSS proposed here. This "collective awareness" of needs, challenges and requirements will form the basis of the design, development and implementation of the proposed DSS. The team also expects this system to be used by scientists and academics active in flood science and hydrology in general. The proposed "one-stop-shop" for flood disaster response will ingest data from many non-NASA operational and research organizations such as USGS, NOAA, ECMWF, JRC and other space agencies, that are active in flood mapping, modeling and forecasting. More »
Project Library
Primary U.S. Work Locations and Key Partners
| Organizations Performing Work | Role | Type | Location |
|---|---|---|---|
| Remote Sensing Solutions, Inc. | Lead Organization | Industry | Barnstable, Massachusetts |
Goddard Space Flight Center
(GSFC)
|
Supporting Organization | NASA Center | Greenbelt, Maryland |
Primary U.S. Work Locations
-
Maryland
-
Massachusetts
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