Current means of monitoring areas in a state of crisis, especially in regards to satellite imagery, are more reactive than proactive in their approach to analysis and management. The use of satellite imagery has evolved in recent years to play a significant role in disaster and crisis management and mitigation. This case study on Nigeria examines a proactive approach to imagery analysis by means of trend mapping using linear regression.

By examining multiple image collections from various sensors, processing data in Google Earth Engine, and performing additional analysis using ArcGIS, it was found that trending Areas of Interest (AOI's) accurately align with locations where violent events have occurred historically.

This work suggests that rapid satellite imagery processing has the ability to play a more contributive role in crisis prediction and mitigation techniques used by government aid workers in acquirig meaningful, situational intelligence. Download the full text below.