A semi-automated approach for mapping geomorphology of El Bardawil Lake, Northern Sinai, Egypt, using integrated remote sensing and GIS techniques

Among the other coastal lakes of the Mediterranean northern coast of Egypt, Bardawil Lake is a unique lagoon, as it is fed only by seawater. The lagoon is composed of two main basins, and several other internal small basins interconnected to one another. Although the general geomorphologic characteristics are treated in some regional studies, we used a semi-automated approach based on a wide variety of digital image processing for mapping the major geomorphological landforms of the lake on a medium scale of 1:250,000. The approach is based primarily on data fusion of Landsat ETM+ image, and validated by other ancillary spatial data (e.g. topographic maps, Google images and GPS in situ data). Interpretations of high resolution space images by Google Earth and the large-scale topographic maps (1:25,000), in specific, revealed new microforms and some detailed geomorphologic aspects with the aid of GPS measurements. Small sand barriers, submerged sand dunes, tidal channels, fans and flats, and micro-lagoons are the recurrent forms in the lake. The approach used in this study could be widely applied to study the low-lying coastal lands along the Nile Delta. However, it is concluded from geological data and geomorphologic aspects that Bardawil Lake is of a tectonic origin; it was much deeper than it is currently, and has been filled with sediments mostly since the Flandrian transgression (∼8–6 ka bp).