Large ship groundings are often difficult to survey by hand. Defining boundaries of affected and non-affected areas is unclear underwater and measurements of long distances by divers can be innaccurate. Landscape mosaics of ship grounding scars (such as the one below) provide users with spatially explicit images that make it easy to define damaged areas and make measurements outside of the water. Additionally surveys of scars using video mosaic technology can be used to monitor recovery and assess any restorative efforts.
OVERVIEW: Mosaic survey of a scar created by a ship grounding on a shallow reef in the Florida Keys (depth = 3-4 m). This survey was conducted in summer 2005. The affected area is over 30m long and up to 10m wide in some areas. Note: a georeferenced version of this mosaic that can be viewed in Google Earth is available for download.
ANALYSIS: Mosaics can be used for: 1. detailed benthic analysis; 2. tracking through time; amd 3. georeferencing within a GIS framerwork, as in the examples below.
DETAILED BENTHIC ANALYSIS
Zoomify program allows rapid web viewing at variable scales, as below..
