ImageCat joins EERI reconnaissance team to deploy VIEWS for the Niigata Chuetsu Earthquake in Japan

November 2004 - As part of EERI’s reconnaissance activities in the aftermath of the Magnitude 6.8 Niigata Chuetsu Earthquake, Charles Huyck joined a multidisciplinary team made of Japanese and U.S. investigators to deploy VIEWS.

VIEWS is a portable reconnaissance system which streamlines damage surveys and serves as an in-field GIS and satellite navigation system. Deployment in the region surrounding Niigata confirmed that VIEWS is a powerful supplement for traditional field damage surveys. Since VIEWS can be deployed by car as well as on foot, large swaths of land can be rapidly video-taped during the narrow window of time between the devastating event and the onset of clean-up operations. In the georeferenced video taken in the Niigata region, green, yellow, or red buildings tags indicating building safety are visible and can be cross-referenced with GIS data such as soil or ground motion. The base imagery collected after the earthquake by DigitalGlobe provided an excellent view of the extensive landslides in areas that were often inaccessible by land.