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Space Administration (NASA) pictorial imagery of a significant proportion
of the country was made available during 1973 and 1974. Along with other
discipline groups, forest managers examined this imagery however their
experience was limited to handling the 4th or 5th generation copies many
months after the imagery was recorded.
Most applications examined in the forestry area were not published and
examples of interest are difficult to locate. In a survey of forestry
authorities carried out on behalf of the Australian Department of Science
in late 1975 (Benson 1976), five forest services indicated interest in
Landsat and three reported the results of their investigations. All
indicated that their conclusions were constrained by the poor quality of
the data used and that better and wider results could be expected to flow
from better quality imagery. Most authorities considered that the mapping
of major forest fires was both practical and of acceptable accurary par-
ticularly where field access was difficult. Smith (1974) reported using
Landsat single band and colour composite imagery to map the Mt Buffalo fire
for total area burnt and areas showing severe damage and crown scorch. The
assessment was carried out 'at a satisfactory level' in 1% hours by simple *
photointerpretation techniques. Some effort was directed to determining
the best colour balance of colour composites for this type of work.
With restrictions placed on the use of the tape recorders on Landsat
in recent years, image acquisition over Australia has been very limited.
The bulk of imagery obtained has been associated with the Large Area Crop
Inventory Experiment (LACIE) sponsored by NASA however special requests for
imagery of natural disasters have generally been met by NASA and wildfires
have on occasions been treated this way. In one such instance McArthur
(CSIRO, D.F.R., pers. comm.), investigating major grass fires in western
Victoria in February 1977, used a standard colour composite Landsat image
to modify his field collected data. It clarified several major anomalies
and could have saved several days in the field had it been available more
quickly.
Imagery has been requested of fires in central and southern New South
Wales and northeast Victoria during the 1977-78 fire season. One request
for coverage in late December 1977 was met but the data did not reach
Australia until mid May and have yet to be evaluated. Such delays are
acceptable when developing applications systems but if satisfactory mapping
accuracy or efficiency can be demonstrated the additional requirement to
provide imagery in as short a time as possible must be met. This can only
be considered where direct data receiving facilities are available for the
region being monitored.
PROSPECTS FOR LANDS AT IMAGERY
IN AUS TE ALI A
The Australian Government decided in mid 1977 that a Landsat Data
Receiving Facility would be installed in Central Australia at Alice Springs
and a Data Processing Facility set up in Canberra. The Australian Landsat