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4. AAS_4503_Biopile8_Deconstruction_TimeSeries

Description

A seven point time series showing the decommissioning of biopile 8 at Casey station, acquired between 31 December 2025 and 16 January 2026. The time series shows the various structural layers of the biopile, including sampling of the geosynthetic clay liner.

Date: 31/12/2025; 06/01/2026;
Pilots: Dr Rebecca McWatters
Platform: DJI M3E RTK
Sensor: DJI M3E (12.29mm) 5280 * 3956 camera
Positioning: M350 connected to D-RTK-2; precise D-RTK-2 antenna location not applied.
Mode: Height above take-off
Australian Antarctic Division – Environmental Stewardship Program
ATEP Permit: Spedding – Project 4503
ReOC: Department of Climate Change, Environment, Energy and Water
Type: VLOS Class 1 (less than 250m for M3E)
Ground crew: Johan Mets, Tim Spedding, Mel Borup, Gavin Allen, Jordan Vink

Purpose

Visualisation, context, geolocation, surface model, site model and transect generation of Casey biopiles 8 and X. Also shows melt conditions in the adjacent melt-lake.

Quality

All flights were undertaken with the same drone, using the same mapping mission, over the same area over the space of 17 days. The GCP network stayed in place throughout, and was surveyed with an Emlid Reach Rx GNSS receiver in FIX mode receiving corrections over the Casey 5G network from the Geoscience Australia CORS base station (cas1) (RTCM 3.x, ITRF2014).

All models were generated in Agisoft Metashape using the same process (image alignment, GCP picking, optimisation using GCP position; point cloud generation; deletion of points with confidence of 1 and errant/edge points; generation of DSM from edited point cloud; generation of orthomosaic; export of DSM and orthomosaic at full resolution in CRS WGS84 UTM 49S).

Orthomosaics have a 5.5mm resolution, Digital Surface Model 11mm.
A ground control point held out of model building was used as a manual check-point (verified across 6 of 7 projects).
Checkpoint RMSE error X 1.6cm
Checkpoint RMSE error Y 1.9 cm
Checkpoint RMSE error Z 5.1 cm

The modelling was very consistent - reflected by the standard deviation on the checkpoint error across the models being very low (5mm X, 4mm Y, 5 mm Z).

Access

These data are not yet publicly available for download.

Temporal Coverages

• Start date: 2025-12-31 - Stop date: 2026-01-16

Spatial Coverages

Data Resolution

Science Keywords

• EARTH SCIENCE > MODELS > LAND SURFACE MODELS
• EARTH SCIENCE > HUMAN DIMENSIONS > ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS > CONTAMINANT LEVELS/SPILLS
• EARTH SCIENCE > SPECTRAL/ENGINEERING > VISIBLE WAVELENGTHS > VISIBLE IMAGERY
• EARTH SCIENCE > HUMAN DIMENSIONS > ENVIRONMENTAL GOVERNANCE/MANAGEMENT > ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENTS

Use Constraints

This data set conforms to the CCBY Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Please follow instructions listed in the citation reference provided at http://data.aad.gov.au/aadc/metadata/citation.cfm?entry_id=AAS_4503_Biopile8_Deconstruction_TimeSeries when using these data.