River discharge is an important component of the water cycle, and an accurate accounting of streamflow can be accomplished by monitoring the spatial and temporal variations in river discharge. The U.S. Geological Survey is actively pursuing remote-sensing platforms to compute river discharge using a combination of satellite-, high altitude-, drone-, and fixed-based platforms to directly measure river width, hydraulic grade, and velocity. QCam is a Doppler (velocity) radar, which is mounted on a 3DR™ Solo drone and measures the along-track river surface-water velocity by spot dwelling at prescribed heights over the river channel.
Field trials were conducted on the South Platte and Arkansas Rivers in Colorado and the Salcha and Tanana Rivers in Alaska.
These platforms coupled with efficient algorithms have the potential to revolutionize streamflow measurements.
Below are other science projects associated with this project.
Under-Ice: Computing Real-time Discharge
Radar on Drones
River discharge is an important component of the water cycle, and an accurate accounting of streamflow can be accomplished by monitoring the spatial and temporal variations in river discharge. The U.S. Geological Survey is actively pursuing remote-sensing platforms to compute river discharge using a combination of satellite-, high altitude-, drone-, and fixed-based platforms to directly measure river width, hydraulic grade, and velocity. QCam is a Doppler (velocity) radar, which is mounted on a 3DR™ Solo drone and measures the along-track river surface-water velocity by spot dwelling at prescribed heights over the river channel.
Field trials were conducted on the South Platte and Arkansas Rivers in Colorado and the Salcha and Tanana Rivers in Alaska.
These platforms coupled with efficient algorithms have the potential to revolutionize streamflow measurements.
Below are other science projects associated with this project.