Data processing architectures for monitoring floods using Sentinel-1

Abstract

Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) images acquired by Earth observation satellites often constitute the only source of information formonitoring the progression of flood events over larger regions. Particularly attractive are the SAR data acquired by the CopernicusSentinel-1 satellites because they are free and open, and combine a short revisit time with a good spatial and radiometric resolution.In this contribution, we discuss how a Sentinel-1 data processing system should be designed to optimally benefit from the denseSentinel-1 time series and advanced algorithms such as change detection or machine learning methods. This was one of the questionsaddressed by an expert group tasked by the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission to investigate the feasibility of anautomated, global, satellite-based flood monitoring product for the Copernicus Emergency Management Service. Drawing fromthe expert group report, we distinguish three broad categories of data processing architectures, namely single-image, dual-image,and data cube processing architectures. While the latter architecture is the most demanding in terms of large storage and computecapacities, it is also the most promising to derive high-quality Sentinel-1 flood maps comprised not just of the flood mask but alsoof data fields describing the retrieval uncertainty and masks showing where Sentinel-1 cannot detect floods due to physical reasons.Therefore, we recommend to use data cube processing architectures and showcase the use of the Austrian Data Cube for monitoringa small-scale flood event that occurred in Austria in November 2019.