Detecting and monitoring plumes caused by major industrial accidents with JPLUME, a new software tool for low-resolution image analysis

A new software tool for the automatic detection and monitoring of plumes caused by major industrial accidents is described. This tool has been designed in order to use near real time information as provided by satellite images, perform sophisticated image analysis and elaborate a user-friendly operational environment for the detection of plumes caused by major industrial accidents. The methodology, based on NOAA/AVHRR (Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer) imagery, uses a two-dimensional feature space in order to discriminate pixels that contain plumes from those that correspond to clouds or to the underlying surface. The two-dimensional feature space is generated by combining AVHRR channels 1 (visible), 2 (near infrared) and 5 (thermal infrared). The software tool proposed has been coded in JAVA2 language, using the concepts of interoperability and object-oriented programming. This study demonstrates the applicability of the tool for the detection of a plume caused by a massive explosion in a firework factory in Enschede, The Netherlands, on May 13, 2000. The effectiveness and reliability of the software tool was found to be satisfactory, as plume was automatically detected and discriminated from the underlying surface.