Flood Mapping in Vegetated and Urban Areas and Other Challenges: Models and Methods

Abstract

Floods are the most frequent weather disasters in the world and the most costly in terms of economic losses. Mapping flood extension is fundamental to ascertain the damage and for relief organization. Spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) systems represent a powerful tool to monitor floods because of their all-weather capability, the very high spatial resolution of the new generation of instruments, and the short revisit time of the present and future satellite constellations. However, mapping flooded vegetated and urban areas still represents a challenging problem.