Corona declassified imagery for land use mapping: Application to Koh Chang, Thailand

This study uses the images from the Corona ‘spy’ satellite, which have been declassified in November 2002 and available on Internet order for a very low cost. The image used dates from 1973 and has about 6m panchromatic characteristics. Along with a Landsat5TM of 1990 and Aster of 2001, a temporal range of about 30 years is achieved. A simple classification of the area was processed and crosschecked manually from the available recent toposheets of Thailand. Results show the development of human infrastructure in the Protected Island of Koh Chang in Thailand, from 1973 to date. Specific human locations are identified linked either to tourism development, or to villages of fishermen. Scope for using Corona in land cover changes on a longer time period than usual satellite images is possible. Some classification issues coming from the sensor have to be taken into account. Accuracy assessment is also an issue because of the age of the sensor.