Evaluation of New Sensors for
Emergency Management
ROBERT BOLUS AND ANDREW BRUZEWICZ
1
OVERVIEW
Hazardous events
Some level of government response is often needed to mitigate the effects of
large-scale natural or technological disasters. Disasters may include but are not
limited to hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, ice jams, tornadoes, wildfires, earth-
quakes, volcanoes, landslides, drought, ice storms, and spills of hazardous mate-
rials. When tasked, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) provides equip-
ment, personnel, and technical assistance as requested. The Remote Sensing/
Geographic Information System Center (RSGISC) has experience in contributing
to response and recovery efforts. It can provide imagery, maps, the geographic
map base, and geographic information system (GIS) coverages, and it can run
GIS models for analysis before, during, and after an event for a synoptic look at
present conditions and prediction into the future (Bruzewicz and Pokrzywka
1999).
Responsible agencies
Corps response actions may occur under Public Law 84-99, which authorizes
the Chief of Engineers to activate the Corps for emergency flood control and
coastal shore protection, or as work for the Federal Emergency Management
Agency (FEMA) under P.L. 93-288 (1988). The FEMA work is often conducted
in conjunction with other agencies, including the National Oceanic and Atmo-
spheric Agency (NOAA), the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the Environ-
mental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Energy (DOE), the Depart-
ment of Transportation (DOT), the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFW), and
the American Red Cross. Regardless of the type of disaster, rapid image acquisi-
tion and analysis is an important initial source of information that can detail
conditions over a wide area. Before an adequate assessment of the extent and
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