Remote sensing monitoring of influence of underground mining in the area of the S3 Express Road

Abstract

Land subsidence is strongly associated with the activities of underground mines. Direct influence of exploitation lead to the formation of subsidence troughs, which are a common phenomenon in the Legnica-Glogow Copper Belt, in southwest Poland, where copper ore is currently intensively mined. As a result, the process of creating troughs may cause significant deformations in the surrounding urban infrastructure, including highways, bridges and railways. Satellite radar interferometry (InSAR), as a remote sensing method, appears to be a useful tool for detecting this type of extensive terrain surface change. Aim of this research was to detect the occurrence of displacements of the S3 Express Road section between the Glogow West Node and the Glogow South Node. For this purpose 29 images provided by European Space Agency (ESA) over descending orbit 22 was obtained from the Sentinel-1A satellite for the period from May 14, 2019 to April 26, 2020. Open source softwares has been used – GMTSAR to generate differential interferograms using the Persistent Scatterer Interferometry (PSI) method and Stanford Method for Persistent Scatterers (StaMPS) to process Persistent Scatterers (PS). The express road, as an anthropogenic object, is characterized by relatively high radar backscatter, thanks to which subsidence of the area are clearly noticeable and indicate the trend of long-term deformations.