Pre-disaster mapping with drones: An urban case study in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

Abstract

We report a case study using drone-based imagery to develop a pre-disaster 3-D map of downtown Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. This represents the first drone mapping mission over an urban area approved by Canada's aviation authority. The goal was to assess the quality of the pre-disaster 3-D data in the context of geospatial accuracy and building representation. The images were acquired with a senseFly eBee Plus fixed-wing drone with real-Time kinematic/post-processed kinematic functionality. Results indicate that the spatial accuracies achieved with this drone would allow for sub-meter building collapse detection, but the non-gimbaled camera was insufficient for capturing building facades.