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PREDICTION OF SHORLINE CHANGE 
BY USING SATELLITE AERIAL IMAGERY 
A. A. Elkoushy *, E. R. A. Tolba ? 
“ Faculty of Engineering- Suez canal university- 42352 Port Said- Egypt 
poston2002 @nilesat.net, chab@sedapnet.org.eg 
KEY WORDS: Coast, Hazards, Photogrammetry, Aerial Images, Shoreline Change 
ABSTRACT: 
The shoreline change due to erosion and/or sedimentation, which are induced by the effect of wave attack and/or the effect of the 
coastal structures extended into the sea, could be studied by using the aerial images. Satellite aerial imagery could play an important 
role in studying the changes of the shoreline. Aerial photography 
and remote sensed images can provide an overview of much wider 
areas and a shorter space of time than the possible used methods of field surveying or GPS. The current study was carried out to 
investigate the shoreline change due to erosion and/or sedimentation by analysing aerial images and comparing its results with that 
obtained from the ordinary methods of surveying. A sufficient accuracy investigated for the shoreline change of Port Said city, which 
located on the northern coast of Egypt, could be obtained by using the advanced soft-wares which covered the biases and noises 
from aerial images. This study showed that the use of aerial images is a useful tool to pull all information together to understand 
what happening in the shoreline and predict the future events. 
1. INTRODUCTION 
Many of the Egyptian coastlines are subjected to varying 
degrees of erosion, high profile example is the region of Port 
Said city, which is located on the northern coast of Egypt. In 
order to understand what is happening around the Egyptian 
coastlines, maritime councils and operating authorities require 
up-to-date and accurate information about the coastal 
geomorphology. They are using ordinary surveying, which are 
concerning with collecting, presenting and using spatial and 
geographic data in digital form. The principles of land 
surveying, geomatics utilities contemporary science and 
technology such as GPS, satellite remote sensing and computer- 
based geographic information system (GIS) are very useful to 
help us understanding the changes occurred in the shoreline. 
For wider area, aerial imagery can be used for a large scale of 
area in which the measurements, and the results achieved 
digitally. 
Coastal engineering studies by remote sensing have not widely 
established. This is because of the fact that the scientists do not 
use the full operational capabilities of remote sensing to coastal 
and environmental studies. Here, the addressed question is that 
whether aerial imagery can help us to investigate the shoreline 
change with high accuracy?. 
Aerial photography can provide an overview of much wider 
areas in a shorter space of time than the possible used methods 
of field surveying and/or GPS, but the results accuracy with 
using aerial imagery must be studied carefully. This study 
shows a sufficient accuracy to trace the shoreline change of the 
studied area using the advanced soft-wares which covered the 
biases and noises from high resolutions images, so the results 
from images can be improved. 
209 
Imagery with the highest available spatial resolution is required 
to detect changes within shorelines. Four primary sources of 
high-resolution satellite imagery had been evaluated: SPOT 
(SPOT Image, Corp.), IRS (Space Imagining, Inc.), SPIN2 
(Aerial Images, Inc), and IKNOS (Space Imagining, Inc). The 
10 meters spatial resolution of SPOT, Smeters spatial resolution 
of IRS, 2 meters spatial resolution of SPIN2 and | meter spatial 
resolution of IKNOS. 
Finally, this study will show that aerial imagery is a useful tool 
to pull all of information getting from aerial images together to 
understand what happening in the shoreline and predict future 
events. 
2. STUDY AREA 
The studied area is the shoreline of Port Said city located on the 
Mediterranean on the north-eastern coast of Egypt between 31? 
17" N to 31° 18’ N and 32° 10’ E to 32? 20' E. This shoreline 
extends about 15 kilometres to the west of Suez Canal. It has 
declined seriously over the past 20 years due to the effect of the 
tidal inlets of El-Manzala lake located at EI-Gamil zone and the 
existence of the western Suez Canal breakwater. The prevailing 
wind and wave directions in this area are northwest yearly with 
net longshore sediment transport moving from west to east. 
3. IMAGES DATA 
The images were taken along the shoreline of Port Said, to the 
north of Egypt. The shoreline of the studied area extends 20 
kilometres long with an elevation ranging from 0.5 meter to 1.5 
meter. Four images, during the period 1991, 1995, 1998, and 
2001 with 2 m resolution, were available and had been used. 
Figure 1 shows the different four images. The scale of images 
was 1:60000.