AN AUTOMATIC UAV MAPPING SYSTEM FOR SUPPORTING UN (UNITED NATIONS) FIELD OPERATIONS

Abstract

The United Nations (UN) has performed field operations worldwide such as peacekeeping or rescue missions. When such an operation is needed, the UN dispatches an operation team usually with a GIS (Geographic Information System) customized to a specific operation. The base maps for the GIS are generated mostly with satellite images which may not retain a high resolution and the current situation. To build an up-to-date high resolution map, we propose a UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) based automatic mapping system, which can operate in a fully automatic way from the data acquisition of sensory data to the data processing for the generation of the geospatial products such as a mosaicked orthoimage of a target area. In this study, we analyse the requirements for UN field operations, suggest a UAV mapping system with an operation scenario, and investigate the applicability of the system. With the proposed system, we can construct a tailored GIS with up-to-date and high resolution base maps for a specific operation efficiently.