OVERVIEW AND FUTURE-TRENDS IN OIL-SPILL REMOTE-SENSING

Remote sensing has great potential to provide data to improve oil spil l response efforts. There are a number of sensors available that have been proven capable of detecting oil on water and measuring some of it s properties. There is no single sensor that provides all the data nee ded, and hence a combination of sensors must be used. Even if finances and aircraft load capacity were unlimited, there are still many param eters of an oil slick that cannot be measured by remote sensing. This paper describes the currently available sensors and their method of op eration and outlines some new developments that have the potential to increase the amount of data available from an airborne remote sensing operation.