Space technology for vulnerability assessment of global transportation infrastructure
- Paper number
IAC-08.B1.5.10
- Author
Prof. Sevda R. Ibrahimova, Azerbaijan National Aerospace Agency, Azerbaijan
- Year
2008
- Abstract
Azerbaijan – Russia transboundary transport corridor is an important part of the “Silk Way”s global infrastructure, the main elements of which are the Baku-Novorossiysk oil pipeline, the Mozdok-Kazimagomed gas pipeline, international trunk-railways and highways, high-voltage electric lines, international communication lines (including fiber optic cables), main water and irrigation lines such as Samur-Apsheron canal, Shollar water canal etc. Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline transports oil of the Caspian countries to the European markets, and the Mozdok-Kazimagomed pipeline delivers Russian gas to electric power stations of Azerbaijan. Railways and highways are used for goods transportation and passenger traffic from Europe to Asia and back. This transport corridor is located on a narrow (3-8 km) strip along the Caspian Sea. The width of the corridor and its density is defined by the relief of the region: Caucasian mountains on the west, and the Caspian Sea on the east. Due to various objective and subjective reasons there is a lot of vulnerable points on the Azeri part of the corridor. The existing methods of vulnerability assessment do not allow obtaining reliable results under conditions of multiparametric influence of natural (mudflows, sliding, erosion, seismic activity etc.) and anthropogenic (random and malevolent) factors. Stable functioning of this transboundary transport corridor influences not only a sustainable development of the economy of Azerbaijan, Russia and other Caspian countries, but this of many European countries as well. This stable functioning depends on various factors, however, the main sources of risk are:
- mudflows from the mountains, erosion of the Caspian coastal line as a result of water level fluctuation, climate change and the seismic activity of the region;
- high vulnerability of the system to the intentional acts of sabotage;
- administrative inaccuracy in defining different scenarios of possible accidents;
- numerous crossings of the infrastructure elements due to the corridor’s narrowness and high infrastructure density.
All these determine a necessity of the digital mapping of the landscape components of the corridor on the basis of high-resolution space information and it’s processing using GIS-technology. We propose a new approach to the vulnerability assessment. Along with the traditional methods of ground-based observations and investigations it is proposed to develop a 3D-digital model of the region on the basis of the surface’s space images. The essence of the space information processing based on spectral brightness of the objects is often incorrect due to spatial changeability of the reflective characteristics of the ground surface classes. The offered method of space images analysis brings to the forefront an accounting of the context information in the algorithms of pattern recognition. Use of methods of the fractal analysis and various Wavelet-transformations allow increasing the accuracy of the space information recognition.
- Abstract document
- Manuscript document
IAC-08.B1.5.10.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).
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