Karin Reinke

RMIT University | RMIT

Satellite remote sensing is a critical tool for continental and synoptic monitoring and mapping of savannah wildfires. Satellite active fire products, which report on the time and location of a fire and may further characterise fire by estimating fire radiative power (FRP), provide valuable utility for savannah fire management and carbon accounting...

Satellite imagery allows us to view landscapes from a bird’s eye view, providing a new dimension in appreciating the environments we inhabit. This alternative perspective has the potential to shape individual perceptions of landscapes and play a pivotal role in land management decision-making and communication. However, the interpretation and appre...

Coastal mallee shrubland wildfires present challenges for accurately predicting fire spread sustainability and rate of spread. In this study, we assess the fuel drivers contributing to coastal mallee shrubland fires. A review of shrubland fire behaviour models and fuel metrics was conducted to determine the current practice of assessing shrubland f...

Flood models rely on accurate topographic data representing the bare earth ground surface. In many parts of the world, the only topographic data available are the free, satellite-derived global Digital Elevation Models (DEMs). However, these have well-known inaccuracies due to limitations of the sensors used to generate them (such as a failure to f...

Burn severity has been widely studied. Typical approaches use spectral differencing indices from remotely sensed data to extrapolate in-situ severity assessments. Next generation geostationary data offer near-continuous fire behaviour information, which has been used for fire detection and monitoring but remains underutilized for fire impact estima...

Accurate estimates of the unperturbed state of upwelling radiation from the earth’s surface are vital to the detection and classification of anomalous radiation values. Determining radiative anomalies in the landscape is critical for isolating change, a key application being wildfire detection, which is reliant upon knowledge of a location’s radiat...

Canopy cover is a primary attribute used in empirical wildfire models for certain fuel types. Accurate estimation of canopy cover is a key to ensuring accurate prediction of fire spread and behaviour in these fuels. Airborne Laser Scanning (ALS) is a promising active remote sensing technology for estimating canopy cover in natural ecosystems since...

Three colour and depth (RGB-D) devices were compared, to assess the effect of depth image misalignment, resulting from simultaneous localisation and mapping (SLAM) error, due to forest structure complexity. Urban parkland (S1) was used to assess stem density, and understory vegetation (≤1.3 m) was assessed in native woodland (S2). Individual stem a...

Geostationary and polar-orbiting remote sensors have different opportunities to observe wildfires. While polar-orbiting sensors have been favoured in wildfire observations, geostationary sensors offer a higher observation frequency. Here, we assess the utility of the Himawari-8 AHI geostationary product and compare it to established polar-orbiting...

The characterisation of fuel distribution across heterogeneous landscapes is important for wildfire mitigation, validating fuel models, and evaluating fuel treatment outcomes. However, efficient fuel mapping at a landscape scale is challenging. Fuel hazard metrics were obtained using Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) and the current operational appr...

Several types of analytic models are currently used to estimate the spatial response of satellite imagers, the accuracy of these models being critical for applications requiring precise knowledge about the spatial response of a given imager. The assessment of these models is complicated because the actual spatial response of an imager depends on it...

The two-dimensional Point Spread Function (PSF) of satellite imaging sensors is usually estimated from two perpendicular edge measurements. It has been shown that this method is only valid for a sensor with a low optical factor “ Q ” (defined as the wavelength times the F number divided by the pixel pitch), so a new method is required to estimate...

A three-criterion taxonomy of metrics to compute the spatial resolution of satellite imagers is presented and used to classify about thirty spatial resolution metrics found in the literature. A new metric, the “Spatial Resolution Function”, is proposed by applying the two-point source resolution criterion to sampled images. This new metric computes...

Considering how individuals perceive landscape is important when undertaking land management decisions. However, understanding how the community perceives a landscape is complex involving their experiences in that landscape, their lived experiences and other socio-cultural processes. One of the key challenges to understanding perception is linking...

The purpose of this research was to derive and evaluate fire radiative power (FRP) values for real-time Biogeographical Region and Individual Geostationary HHMMSS Threshold (BRIGHT)/Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) hotspots. While BRIGHT/AHI hotspots with 2 km nominal resolution are available every 10 min, they are without FRP values. Here, we presen...

Background We compared estimates of Fire Radiative Power (FRP) from sensors onboard geostationary Himawari-8 (BRIGHT_AHI) and polar-orbiting TERRA/AQUA (MOD14/MYD14) satellites during the 2019/2020 Black Summer Fires in South-Eastern Australia. Aim/methods Analysis was performed on a pixel, bioregion, and wildfire event basis to assess the utility...

Limitations with benchmark light detection and ranging (LiDAR) technologies in forestry have prompted the exploration of handheld or wearable low-cost 3D sensors (<2000 USD). These sensors are now being integrated into consumer devices, such as the Apple iPad Pro 2020. This study was aimed at determining future research recommendations to promote t...

Canopy cover is a primary attribute used in empirical wildfire models for certain fuel types. Accurate estimation of canopy cover is key to ensuring accurate prediction of fire spread and behaviour in these fuels. Airborne Laser Scanning (ALS) is a promising active remote sensing technology for estimating canopy cover in natural eco-systems since i...

Advances in fire behaviour modelling provide a catalyst for the development of next generation fuel inputs. Fire simulations underpin risk and consequence mapping and inform decisions regarding ecological and social impacts of different fire regimes. Unoccupied Aerial Systems (UAS) carrying Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) sensors have been prop...

Computational models of wildfires are necessary for operational prediction and risk assessment. These models require accurate spatial fuel data and remote sensing techniques have ability to provide high spatial resolution raster data for landscapes. We modelled a series of fires to understand and quantify the impact of the spatial resolution of fue...

Wildfire continues to be a major environmental problem in the world. To help land and fire management agencies manage and mitigate wildfire-related risks, we need to develop tools for mapping those risks. Big geodata—in the form of remotely sensed images, ground-based sensor observations, and topographical datasets—can help us characterize the dyna...

This paper introduces an enhanced version of the Biogeographical Region and Individual Geostationary HHMMSS Threshold (BRIGHT) algorithm. The algorithm runs in real-time and operates over 24 h to include both daytime and night-time detections. The algorithm was executed and tested on 12 months of Himawari-8 data from 1 April 2019 to 31 March 2020,...

With an increase in the frequency and severity of wildfires across the globe and resultant changes to long-established fire regimes, the mapping of fire severity is a vital part of monitoring ecosystem resilience and recovery. The emergence of unoccupied aircraft systems (UAS) and compact sensors (RGB and LiDAR) provide new opportunities to map fir...

In recent years, Unoccupied Aircraft Systems (UAS) have been used to capture information on forest structure in unprecedented detail. Pioneering studies in this field have shown that high spatial resolution images and Light Detecting And Ranging (LiDAR) data captured from these platforms provide detailed information describing the dominant tree ele...

The perception of landscapes involves the process of categorising and differentiating surrounds according to sensory information and the experiences of individuals. Increasingly, due to the ubiquitous nature of virtual globe platforms, individuals are accessing visual information about their surrounding environment through satellite imagery. This i...

Forest and urban tree inventory measurements are increasingly adopting Remote Sensing (RS) techniques due to the accurate and rapid estimates available compared to conventional methods. The focus of this study is to assess the accuracy and potential application of the Microsoft Azure Kinect – a lightweight depth sensor – for outdoor measurement of...

Site-specific information concerning fuel hazard characteristics is needed to support wildfire management interventions and fuel hazard reduction programs. Currently, routine visual assessments provide subjective information, with the resulting estimate of fuel hazard varying due to observer experience and the rigor applied in making assessments. T...

This article introduces a new algorithm to detect active fires in geostationary remotely sensed data. The algorithm calculated dynamic statistical multispectral thresholds based on, and sensitive to, biogeographical region, subseason, and time-of-day. The spectral characteristics of nonfire and noncloud mid-infrared values were found to vary with b...

The Gunbower Yemurriki Map details important information about Barapa Country and Barapa people for the purpose of education. The Barapa are the Traditional Owners of the lands north and south of the Murray River around Cohuna, Australia and are working with natural resource agencies to identify and map cultural assets on traditional lands, particu...

Characteristics describing below canopy vegetation are important for a range of forest ecosystem applications including wildlife habitat, fuel hazard and fire behaviour modelling, understanding forest recovery after disturbance and competition dynamics. Such applications all rely on accurate measures of vegetation structure. Inherent in this is the...

Wildfires have demonstrated their destructive powers in several parts of the world in recent years. In an effort to mitigate the hazard of large catastrophic wildfires, a common practice is to reduce fuel loads in the landscape. This can be achieved through prescribed burning or mechanically. Prioritising areas to treat is a challenge for landscape...

Percent vegetation cover is important variable used in understanding ecosystem processes, vegetation health and productivity. Downward looking images captured using a handheld camera have been demonstrated as a viable option for rapidly capturing in situ information to assess vegetation cover. This technique, however, is prone to perspective distor...

The AHI-FSA (Advanced Himawari Imager - Fire Surveillance Algorithm) is a recently developed algorithm designed to support wildfire surveillance and mapping using the geostationary Himawari-8 satellite. At present, the AHI-FSA algorithm has only been tested on a number of case study fires in Western Australia. Initial results demonstrate potential...

Active wildfire detection, surveillance and mapping is an important application of satellite remote sensing. The Active Fire Monitoring (FIR) products, from the Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infrared Imager (SEVIRI) on board the Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) satellites, provide rapid-fire detection data every 5 to 15 over the European and Africa...

An integral part of any remotely sensed fire detection and attribution method is an estimation of the target pixel’s background temperature. This temperature cannot be measured directly independent of fire radiation, so indirect methods must be used to create an estimate of this background value. The most commonly used method of background temperat...

A vital component of fire detection from remote sensors is the accurate estimation of the background temperature of an area in fire's absence, assisting in identification and attribution of fire activity. New geostationary sensors increase the data available to describe background temperature in the temporal domain. Broad area methods to extract th...

Reducing the fuel load in fire-prone landscapes is aimed at mitigating the risk of catastrophic wildfires but there are ecological consequences. Maintaining habitat for fauna of both sufficient extent and connectivity while fragmenting areas of high fuel loads presents land managers with seemingly contrasting objectives. Faced with this dichotomy,...

Visual assessment, following guides such as the Overall Fuel Hazard Assessment Guide (OFHAG), is a common approach for assessing the structure and hazard of varying bushfire fuel layers. Visual assessments can be vulnerable to imprecision due to subjectivity between assessors, while emerging techniques such as image-based point clouds can offer lan...

Fire detection from satellite sensors relies on an accurate estimation of the unperturbed state of a target pixel, from which an anomaly can be isolated. Methods for estimating the radiation budget of a pixel without fire depend upon training data derived from the location's recent history of brightness temperature variation over the diurnal cycle,...

Quantitative measurements of above‐ground vegetation biomass are vital to a range of ecological and natural resource management applications. Remote‐sensing techniques, such as terrestrial laser scanning (TLS) and image‐based point clouds, are potentially revolutionary techniques for measuring vegetation biomass and deriving other related, structur...

Fire detection from satellite sensors relies on an accurate estimation of the unperturbed state of a target pixel, from which an anomaly can be isolated. Methods for estimating the radiation budget of a pixel without fire depend upon training data derived from the location's recent history of brightness temperature variation over the diurnal cycle,...

Fuel reduction burns are commonly used in fire-prone forests to reduce the risk of wildfire and increase ecosystem resilience. As such assessing and mapping the changes in the landscape brought on by such burns is an important step in understanding the degree to which these desired modifications have occurred. This study aims to quantify the change...

Satellite remote sensing is regularly used for wildfire detection, fire severity mapping and burnt area mapping. Applications in the surveillance of wildfire using geostationary-based sensors have been limited by low spatial resolutions. With the launch in 2015 of the AHI (Advanced Himawari Imaginer) sensor on board Himawari-8, ten-minute interval...

The detection and characterization of wildfires using satellite remote-sensing systems has improved considerably over the last 30 years, with daily, global coverage maintained by a number of satellite systems. The recent deployment of new satellite systems, such as Technologie-Erprobungs-Träger-1 (TET-1/Technology-Experiments-Carrier-1), with a hig...

Assessment of ecological and structrual changes induced by fire events is important for understanding the effects of fire, and planning future ecological and risk mitigation strategies. This study employs Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS) data captured at multiple points in time to monitor the changes in a dry sclerophyll forest induced by a prescri...

Wildfire detection and attribution is an issue of importance due to the socio-economic impact of fires in Australia. Early detection of fires allows emergency response agencies to make informed decisions in order to minimise loss of life and protect strategic resources in threatened areas. Until recently, the ability of land management authorities...

Wildfire detection and attribution is an issue of importance due to the socio-economic impact of fires in Australia. Early detection of fires allows emergency response agencies to make informed decisions in order to minimise loss of life and protect strategic resources in threatened areas. Until recently, the ability of land management authorities...

Fuel treatment activities are primarily driven by the need to reduce fuel accumulation in fire-prone landscapes to reduce the risk of catastrophic wildfires, with occasional fuel treatments designed to address ecological objectives. Reducing fuel in the landscape while maintaining habitat for fauna, fragmenting areas of high fuel loads while ensuri...

Uncontrolled wildfires can lead to loss of life and property and destruction of natural resources. At the same time, fire plays a vital role in restoring ecological balance in many ecosystems. Fuel management, or treatment planning by way of planned burning, is an important tool used in many countries where fire is a major ecosystem process. In thi...

Quantifying post-fire effects in a forested landscape is important to ascertain burn severity, ecosystem recovery and post-fire hazard assessments and mitigation planning. Reporting of such post-fire effects assumes significance in fire-prone countries such as USA, Australia, Spain, Greece and Portugal where prescribed burns are routinely carried o...

Prescribed burning, a common fire management practice is routinely carried out by government departments and land management agencies to reduce wildfire hazard. To understand and measure the impacts of these fires on the landscape, spectral data from Eucalypt trees of an Australian dry sclerophyll forest was captured pre- and post-burn at two spati...

Prescribed burning is a landscape management tool often used for asset protection and ecological maintenance. Accordingly, there is a need to understand the effects fire has on the landscape and how these changes might be measured. Remote sensing pre-and post-burn has the potential to inform decisions about burn severity and ecosystem sensitivity t...

A Terrestrial LiDAR system or Terrestrial Laser Scanner (TLS) was used to detect changes in burnt landscapes. Since wildfires are a common occurrence in the Australian landscape, prescribed burns are routinely carried out by land management agencies and government departments. These prescribed burns reduce the fuel load which decreases the severity...

This paper presents a new unsupervised classification method which aims to effectively and efficiently map remote sensing data. The Mean-Shift (MS) algorithm, a non parametric density-based clustering technique, is at the core of our method. This powerful clustering algorithm has been successfully used for both the classification and the segmentati...

Responding to the threat of wildfire on human and natural resources is important, particularly in countries such as Australia where large areas of land are required to be observed and managed. Remote sensing techniques are an obvious choice in providing fire related information over large areas for emergency services in responding timely to outbrea...

This paper investigates the association between night-time lights and socio-economic metrics at the regional level. This regional level of understanding is critical as it underpins much economic monitoring and policy-making for sustainable development. Stable light data obtained from night time images of 2001, captured by Defense Meteorological Sat...

The problem addressed is this: most environmental issues require context to solve them. Is the ocean getting warmer? Is the desert growing? Is the forest declining? Solution: measure the temperature / size / leaf area. But such measurements only have significance if there are other comparable historical measurements to compare them too. This paper...

Digital map products are routinely used by land managers and policy makers for environmental decision-making. This paper assesses the ability of such products to detect woody vegetation, particularly remnant patches which serve as critical landscape structures. Comparisons are made between two map products (NCAS and a SPOT-based classification) and...

The Operational Linescan System (OLS) onboard the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) group of satellites, unlike other passive remote sensing sensors, is capable of recording the emissions from artificial lights on the earth surface. Along with detecting light from forest fires, shipping fleets and gas flares, the OLS sensor also recor...