“The best of both worlds” – connecting remote sensing and Arctic communities for safe sea ice travel

• Main Author: Segal, Rebecca
• Other Authors: Scharien, Randall
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: Arctic sea ice; Inuit knowledge; remote sensing; sea ice roughness; safety and navigation; Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR); Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR); cryosphere; climate change; Arctic; Cambridge Bay; Kugluktuk; Nunavut; Climate change; inuit; Kitikmeot; Sea ice
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/1828/11129

This thesis examines the role of remote sensing technology in providing information to northern residents of Kugluktuk and Cambridge Bay, Kitikmeot region of Nunavut, Western Canadian Arctic, for the purpose of improving sea ice trafficability and safety. The main objectives of this thesis include 1) the identification of northern community sea ice information needs that can be addressed using remote sensing, and 2) the creation of remote sensing-based products showing sea ice surface roughness information useful to community sea ice trafficability and safety. Thesis outcomes include the refinement and dissemination of information and products with these communities. Research methods involved interviews with northern community members that were analysed using thematic analysis, as well as quantitative assessments of sea ice roughness using satellite datasets. Maps of sea ice surface roughness were created using Sentinel-1 synthetic aperture radar and the Multi-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer, and were evaluated against fine-scale airborne LiDAR data. Graduate 2020-07-31