Abstract
Alpine glaciers are strongly suffering the consequences of the temperature rising and monitoring them over long periods is of particular interest for climate change tracking. A wide range of techniques can be successfully applied to survey and monitor glaciers with different spatial and temporal resolutions. However, going back in time to retrace the evolution of a glacier is still a challenging task. Historical aerial images, e.g., those acquired for regional cartographic purposes, are extremely valuable resources for studying the evolution and movement of a glacier in the past. This work analyzed the evolution of the Belvedere Glacier by means of structure from motion techniques applied to digitalized historical aerial images combined with more recent digital surveys, either from aerial platforms or UAVs. This allowed the monitoring of an Alpine glacier with high resolution and geometrical accuracy over a long span of time, covering the period 1977–2019. In this context, digital surface models of the area at different epochs were computed and jointly analyzed, retrieving the morphological dynamics of the Belvedere Glacier. The integration of datasets dating back to earlier times with those referring to surveys carried out with more modern technologies exploits at its full potential the information that at first glance could be thought obsolete, proving how historical photogrammetric datasets are a remarkable heritage for glaciological studies.
Highlights
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Thiswith allowed monitoring of an applied to digitalized historical images combined morethe recent digital surveys, Alpine glacier with high resolution and geometrical accuracy over a long span of either from aerial platforms or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). This allowed the monitoring of an Alpinetime, glacier with high resolution and geometrical accuracy over a long span of time, which is crucial for the considered application
The coordinates of nine groups of ground control points (GCPs) and eight groups of control points (CPs), well distributed over the whole area, were retrieved from the aerial images acquired with the DMC digital photogrammetry system
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. In situ glaciological measurements to quantify volume variations and mass balances, are extremely time consuming, and they usually require mountaineering expertise, as the environment is often dangerous To overcome this limit, photogrammetry is a widely used technique for building 3D models of glacier surfaces by means of pairs (or groups) of overlapping images. SfM techniques, historical aerial can images can be to build geometrically accurateaccurate photogrammetric modelsmodels of large-scale glaciers [27,28]. From such models, digital models surface (DSMs) models and (DSMs) and orthophotos can be to compute to volumetric displacements and velocities or velocities to compute retrieved compute variations, volumetric surface variations, surface displacements and or mass to balances. The surveys were carried out in different epochs, roughly well distributed in time, so as to capture the morphology of the glacier and quantify volume variations that occurred
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