Extraction of Sea Surface Temperature in Coastal Area Using Ground-Based Thermal Infrared Sensor On-Boarded to Aircraft

The Sea Surface Temperature (SST) is one of the most important oceanic environmental factors in determining the change of marine environments and ecological activities. Satellite thermal infrared images can be effective for understanding the global trend of sea surface temperature due to large scale. However, their low spatial resolution caused some limitations in some areas where complicated and refined coastal shapes due to many islands are present as in the Korean Peninsula. The coastal ocean is also very important because human activities interact with the environmental change of coastal area and most aqua farming is distributed in the coastal ocean. Thus, low-cost airborne thermal infrared remote sensing with high resolution capability is considered for verifying its possibility to extract SST and to monitor the changes of coastal environment. In this study, an airborne thermal infrared system was implemented using a low-cost and ground-based thermal infrared camera (FLIR), and more than 8 airborne acquisitions were carried out in the western coast of the Korean Peninsula during the periods between May 23, 2012 and December 7, 2013. The acquired thermal infrared images were radiometrically calibrated using an atmospheric radiative transfer model with a support from a temperature-humidity sensor, and geometrically calibrated using GPS and IMU sensors. In particular, the airborne sea surface temperature acquired in June 25, 2013 was compared and verified with satellite SST as well as ship-borne thermal infrared and in-situ SST data. As a result, the airborne thermal infrared sensor extracted SST with an accuracy of 1oC.