Publication Notices

Notifications of New Publications Released by ERDC

Contact Us

      

  

    866.362.3732

   601.634.2355

 

ERDC Library Catalog

Not finding what you are looking for? Search the ERDC Library Catalog

Results:
Tag: drones
Clear
  • First Generation Automated Assessment of Airfield Damage from LiDAR Point Clouds

    Abstract: This research developed an automated software technique for identifying type, size, and location of man-made airfield damage including craters, spalls, and camouflets from a digitized three-dimensional point cloud of the airfield surface. Point clouds were initially generated from Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) sensors mounted on elevated lifts to simulate aerial data collection and, later, an actual unmanned aerial system. LiDAR data provided a high-resolution, globally positioned, and dimensionally scaled point cloud exported in a LAS file format that was automatically retrieved and processed using volumetric detection algorithms developed in the MATLAB software environment. Developed MATLAB algorithms used a three-stage filling technique to identify the boundaries of craters first, then spalls, then camouflets, and scaled their sizes based on the greatest pointwise extents. All pavement damages and their locations were saved as shapefiles and uploaded into the GeoExPT processing environment for visualization and quality control. This technique requires no user input between data collection and GeoExPT visualization, allowing for a completely automated software analysis with all filters and data processing hidden from the user.