Why multi-sensor satellite data are needed for lava volume estimation

Abstract:
Information on the lava-effusion-rate is important as this enables the modelling of the expected lava flow lengths, duration and associated hazards. Several Earth-observation-based techniques have been developed to estimate the lava-effusionrate. Thermal data-based-methodologies, linking the lava flows’ thermal emission with the lava viscosity and topographicdifferencing- approaches. Thermal observations are available every few hours, but at low spatial resolution. VHR data, needed for the second approach, however, are not available daily. None of the approaches is able to provide both information on short-term-changes and high-precise measurements of the absolute amount of erupted lava. This is only possible by combination of multi-sensor-data.