US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) established the Joint Airborne Lidar Bathymetry Technical Center of Expertise (JALBTCX) in 1996 with a mission to perform operations, research, and development in airborne lidar bathymetry. USACE R&D had recently developed and fielded the Scanning Hydrographic Operational Airborne Lidar Survey (SHOALS) System in collaboration with industry partner Optech and building on R&D of the US Navy, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and academia. USACE R&D also pioneered the use of airborne lidar bathymetry data in coastal engineering practice. JALBTCX operated the SHOALS system using surveying and mapping contractor support and continued to demonstrate the utility of airborne lidar bathymetry data to coastal engineers.
Since those early days, JALBTCX added Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command’s Naval Oceanographic Office (NAVOCEANO, 1998), NOAA’s National Ocean Service (2002), and US Geological Survey (2012) as formal partners. JALBTCX led the development of three more generations of airborne lidar bathymetry systems and field tested and validated many of the airborne lidar bathymetry systems available in the market through the years. JALBTCX performs mapping operations year-round and worldwide using government-owned sensors operated by surveying and mapping contractors for USACE National Coastal Mapping Program (NCMP), NAVOCEANO Airborne Coastal Surveys, and work for others, most notably post-hurricane mapping for Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The JALBTCX partners coordinate mapping efforts to ensure efficient and effective use of Federal mapping dollars. JALBTCX partners have long shared scopes of work and standard operating procedures and have recently combined all this information into a JALBTCX Airborne Lidar Bathymetry Specification that will be used by the partners and shared with the broader community.
JALBTCX continues its tradition of collaboration across sectors by convening an annual workshop. Since 1999, the JALBTCX Workshop provides a venue for collaboration among academia, industry, and the federal government to constantly review, refine, and expand capabilities in airborne coastal mapping and charting systems, data collection and processing, and coastal engineering, nautical charting, and environmental applications of airborne lidar bathymetry data. The workshop is routinely attended by 100+ participants from around the world including system manufacturers, airborne survey services providers, data users, and researchers.
In 2019, the broader JALBTCX community produced Airborne Laser Hydrography II, a follow-on to the original Airborne Laser Hydrography: System Design and Performance Factors, which was a NOAA Technical report published in 1985 that inspired the development of the SHOALS system. The 2019 version captured the combined knowledge gained in the intervening 34 years in the areas of system development, environmental optical properties, system design, data processing, performance evaluation, applications, ancillary systems and fusion.
USACE continues its pioneering work in the use of airborne lidar bathymetry data for coastal engineers through NCMP R&D. NCMP repetitively collects airborne lidar bathymetry and topography, with aerial photography and hyperspectral imagery, continuously around the sandy shorelines of the United States. NCMP R&D turns these data into standard information products that coastal engineers use to compute sediment volumes for regional sediment management, model coastal waves and water levels for flood and project performance studies, compute metrics to quantify vulnerability and resilience of our Nation’s coasts, quantify amounts and benefits of natural and nature-based features and critical habitats, monitor physical condition of coastal projects like beaches and jetties, and design and monitor beneficial sediment placements. NCMP is currently working on its 4th survey of the lower 48 since 2004 and has surveyed the Hawaiian Islands twice and 65 Alaska communities.
