Asia-Pacific
NASA deploys research aircraft to assess oil spill
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-05-12 13:19
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LOS ANGELES - NASA has commissioned its instrumented research aircraft, the Earth Resources-2 (ER-2), to the Gulf of Mexico to help assess the spread and impact of the current massive oil spill, it was announced on Tuesday.
The ER-2 was sent to collect detailed images of the Gulf of Mexico and its threatened coastal wetlands, said the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), headquartered in Pasadena, Los Angeles.
The aircraft is outfitted with JPL's Airborne Visible/Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS) and the Cirrus Digital Camera System, supplied by NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif., the JPL said.
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Along the way, the plane collected data over the Gulf coast and the oil slick to support spill mapping and document the condition of coastal wetlands before oil makes landfall, said the laboratory, adding that the ER-2 made a second flight on May 10 and that more flights are planned,
NASA is also making extra satellite observations and conducting additional data processing to assist NOAA, the US Geological Survey and the Department of Homeland Security in monitoring the spill, said the JPL.
"NASA has been asked to help with the first response to the spill, providing imagery and data that can detect the presence, extent and concentration of oil," said Michael Goodman, program manager for natural disasters in the Earth Science Division of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.
"We also have longer-term work we have started in the basic research of oil in the ocean and its impacts on sensitive coastal ecosystems," he added.
Researchers also plan to measure changes in vegetation along the coastline and assess where and how oil may be affecting marshes, swamps, bayous and beaches that are difficult to survey on the ground.
The combination of satellite and airborne imagery will assist NOAA in forecasting the trajectory of the oil and in documenting changes in the ecosystem, said the JPL.
From the outset of the spill on April 20, NASA has provided satellite images to federal agencies to help assess the spread of the spill.
