WA2016B - Nullarbor Cliffs

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Collaborative Project with Riegl Lasermesstechnik, Austria (October 2016)

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During a ferry flight from Adelaide to NW-Western Australia, via Ceduna and Forrest, a Riegl VUX-1UAV was tested on a flight along the near-vertical cliffs of the Nullarbor Coast - the "Edge of Australia". The scanner was mounted under the wing of the ARA DIMO scanning downwards and sideways taking in the complete cliff face.

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"We actually flew about 170km(!) along the cliffs, from the Head of the Great Australian Bight to close to Eucla. After landing at Forrest, WA, the VUX-1UAV data (20GB in total) was processed on a laptop PC as was the data from the OXTS xNAV GPS/IMU that was used to geo-rectify the point clouds. Both units worked extremely well ! Once we are back home, we will re-process all data using our standard workflow which will give even more spectacular and accurate data. We also had a GoPro Hero3+ on-board pointing at the cliffs. Luckily the wind was blowing mainly from the land, so the aircraft (and scanner) did not get covered in salt. After the flight we landed at Forrest (at the railway line) and got stuck there for 2 days - but that's another story..."

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Participants: The ARA-team; Gustavo Cao Cancio, Spain; Muriel Lavy, Italy.