News
See a geographical representation of news
-
International Charter activated for earthquake and tsunami off Solomon Islands Thu Feb 7 2013The International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" was activated on 6 February for the 0.8 magnitude earthquake that took place off the coast of Solomon Islands and the subsequent 0.9 m tsunami that struck the Santa Cruz Islands at 01:12 GMT on the same day. The international mechanisms to provide satellite information and maps after major disasters was triggered by UNITAR/UNOSAT. Five people...
-
4th Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction “Invest today for a Safer Tomorrow” Wed Feb 6 2013The 4th Global Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction will be held in Geneva, Switzerland, from 19 to 23 May at the International Conference Centre of Geneva (CICG). Heads of State, government ministers, parliamentarians, CEOs, scientists and civil society representatives will meet to discuss a new global framework to reduce disaster risk. It is expected that around 3,000 people will attend this...
-
Flooding patters: Seeing wetlands in South Sudan from space Wed Feb 6 2013The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (Jaxa) supplied remote sensing data to the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) to elaborate an up-to-date map of the Sudd, one of the largest tropical wetlands in the world located in South Sudan. The project was carried out in the framework of JAXA's Kyoto and Carbon (K&C) Initiative."The wetland as a whole and its dynamics have...
-
NASA: EO-1 satellite captures floods in Mozambique Tue Feb 5 2013After days of torrential rain pushed the lower Limpopo River over its banks in late January 2013, flood water surrounded the city of Xai-Xai in southern Mozambique. The Advanced Land Imager (ALI) on NASA’s Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite captured this natural-color image on January 31. Xai-Xai is situated about 10 kilometers (6 miles) from the ocean, where the Limpopo River meanders over...
-
Thailand: Bushfire surveillance campaign launched Mon Feb 4 2013Thailand's Deputy Prime Minister Plodprasop Suraswadi has ordered northern provincial authorities to use satellite surveillance to monitor bushfires and cut down on haze pollution. He said satellite imagery was the most accurate tool to detect bushfire hotspots and should form an integral part of the government's campaign to reduce haze pollution in the North. "Every province is required to...
-
Extreme rainfall coincides with rising global temperature Mon Feb 4 2013A worldwide review of global rainfall data led by the University of Adelaide has found that the intensity of the most extreme rainfall events is increasing across the globe as temperatures rise. In the most comprehensive review of changes to extreme rainfall ever undertaken, researchers evaluated the association between extreme rainfall and atmospheric temperatures at more than 8000 weather...
-
International Chapter activated for flooding in the Republic of Seychelles Fri Feb 1 2013The International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" was activated on 01 February because of the impact of the Tropical Cyclone Felleng in the Republic of Seychelles last week. The mechanism was activated by UNITAR/UNOSAT on behalf of UNOCHA. A state of emergency has been declared in Mahe, the largest island of the Republic of Seychelles, following the passing of Tropical Cyclone...
-
DigitalGlobe and GeoEye complete Combination Fri Feb 1 2013DigitalGlobe, Inc. (NYSE: DGI) ("DigitalGlobe") and GeoEye, Inc. (NASDAQ: GEOY) ("GeoEye"), on 31 January 2013 announced the completion of their combination, creating a global leader in earth imagery and geospatial analysis. The combined company will trade on the NYSE stock exchange as DigitalGlobe under the symbol DGI. Based on the closing price of DigitalGlobe stock on...
-
International Charter activated for floods in Indonesia Fri Feb 1 2013Heavy seasonal rain swept across Indonesia during the days between 17 and 19 January 2013. Subsequently, Indonesia's capital Jakarta has been affected by heavy floods. On 30 January, 2013 the International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" was activated for inundations in the city. The mechanism was triggered by USGS on behalf of BPPT Indonesia to provide space data of the...
-
ADRC co-organizes Asian Conference on Disaster Reduction 2013 Thu Jan 31 2013UN-SPIDER's Regional Support Office, the Asian Disaster Reduction Centre (ADCR), in cooperation with the Government of Japan (Cabinet Office) and the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR) organized the Asian Conference on Disaster Reduction (ACDR) 2013. The conference took place on 23 January 2013 in Kobe, Japan. The goal of ACDR 2013 was to promote information...
-
Earthquakes: California could establish Early Warning System Thu Jan 31 2013The state of California could establish an $80 million early warning system for earthquakes. “Three weeks ago, the California Institute of Technology and the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology published a study concluding for the first time that a statewide California earthquake involving both the Los Angeles and San Francisco metropolitan areas may be possible. This...
-
NASA: Measuring Ocean-Surface Winds from Space Thu Jan 31 2013In a clever reuse of hardware originally built to test parts of NASA's QuikScat satellite, the agency will launch the ISS-RapidScat instrument to the International Space Station in 2014 to measure ocean-surface wind speed and direction. The ISS-RapidScat instrument will help improve weather forecasts, including hurricane monitoring, and understanding of how ocean-atmosphere interactions influence...
-
IFRC: Guidelines on Community Early Warning Systems Wed Jan 30 2013The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has published a booklet with guiding principles on community early warning systems. The booklet is available online. Early warning is one of many important tools that contribute to the prevention of disasters and preparedness for hazards and threats, of any kind. It greatly enhances disaster risk reduction. The booklet...
-
How Geodesign can help Recovery and Disaster Risk Management after Hurricane Sandy Tue Jan 29 2013After hurricane Sandy hit New York and New Jersey in late October 2012, recovery and reconstruction have been underway. Larry Greenemeier, author at the Scientific American, underlines the importance of Geodesign in this process. "Geodesign is an approach to city planning, land use and natural resource management that takes into account the tendency in recent years to overdevelop land at the...
-
Volcanoes: Free database on major volcanic eruptions available Tue Jan 29 2013Details of around 2,000 major volcanic eruptions which occurred over the last 1.8 million years have been made available in a new open access database, complied by scientists at the University of Bristol with colleagues from the UK, US, Colombia and Japan. The open access database of Large Magnitude Explosive Eruptions (LaMEVE) will provide this crucial information to researchers, civil...
-
Envisat-Meris images available free of charge Sun Jan 27 2013The VITO image processing team in collaboration with ESA and Belgian Science Policy announced a new free product in the world of low resolution Earth observation data, the global Envisat-MERIS 10-daily composites at 1 km resolution (EM10). The Envisat-Meris S10 or "EM10" are near-global, 10-daily composite images which are synthesised from the "best available" observations...
-
Africa to address post-2015 disaster resilience agenda Sat Jan 26 2013Governments from over 50 countries in Africa will meet in Arusha, Tanzania from 13-15 February for the Fourth Africa Regional Platform on Disaster Risk Reduction (ARP) to address the challenges of building a disaster resilient society. "With global warming affecting agriculture and livelihoods in a continent where agriculture contributes 50% of total exports and 21% of total GDP, it is...
-
German Center for Satellite Based Crisis Information launches regular operations Fri Jan 25 2013From the research stage to full operation – The Center for Satellite Based Crisis Information (ZKI) is now on call around the clock. This service facility established in 2004 provides up-to-the minute satellite-based maps for activities related to natural and environmental disasters, humanitarian aid, and civil security worldwide. It is a service of DLR’s German Remote Sensing Data Center. On 22...
-
Early Warning: European Environment Agency publishes lessons learned Thu Jan 24 2013New technologies have sometimes had very harmful effects, but in many cases the early warning signs have been suppressed or ignored. The second volume of Late Lessons from Early Warnings published by the European Environment Agency (EEA) investigates specific cases where danger signals have gone unheeded, in some cases leading to deaths, illness and environmental destruction. The first volume of...
-
GPS: Improving performance with small satellite approach Wed Jan 23 2013The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) has selected Surrey Satellite Technology US LLC (SST-US) to investigate cost reduction and augmentation of the current Global Positioning System (GPS) constellation through the application of the small satellite approach. SST-US will examine how constellations of smaller satellites could improve the overall system performance and resilience, including ways...
