A rapid mapping approach to quantify damages caused by the 2003 bam earthquake using high resolution multitemporal optical images

This paper aims to reveal a methodology used to quantitatively evaluate the impact of an earthquake on a region, considering multi temporal high resolution optical images. The proposed approach was initiated in the frame of GEODIM Project whose goal is to develop a Romanian downstream emergency response service in order to contribute to current disaster and risk management approach based on Earth observation data. The project is focused on developing experimental processing algorithms and mapping products for natural disasters (floods, earthquakes, landslides) damage assessment in urban areas based on very high resolution optical and SAR satellite imagery acquired worldwide. The prospective scenario considers knowledge discovery from pre and post event satellite images by mapping the extracted data features into semantic classes and symbolic representations like “buildings”, “vegetation”, “streets”, “bare land” and “damaged buildings”, etc.