California Wildfires

In the fall of 2003, Fugro EarthData provided rapid response mapping to help firefighters and local authorities quickly assess damages and improve recovery efforts as they battled the wildfires that were raging through Southern California. Mobilizing immediately, and partnering with ESRI who coordinated efforts with the Southern California firefighting command centers, Fugro EarthData used its Leica ADS40 digital image acquisition and Pixel Factory™ processing technologies to produce, within 6 weeks, 50-cm-pixel-resolution maps of three areas comprising 3,143 sq mi. Firefighters used color-infrared imagery to delineate burned areas and to assess damages to forests and residential areas. The ADS40/Pixel Factory derived DEM was used to assess the risk of mudslides over the scorched terrain. Since the disaster, multiple end-users have used the data for long-term planning and risk mitigation.