USING HIGH SPATIAL RESOLUTION SATELLITE IMAGERY TO DETECT FINE SCALE
SEDIMENT FEATURES IN THE RIO DE LA PLATA TURBID WATERS
Ana I. Dogliotti1, Quinten Vanhellemont2, Kevin Ruddick2, Juan I. Gossn1, Diego Moreira3,4, Claudia
Simionato3,4
The Río de la Plata (RdP) river, located at 35°S on the Atlantic west coast, is considered among the
most turbid waters of the world. This system is of great social, ecological and economical importance
for the countries on its shores, Argentina and Uruguay. The Capital cities of those countries (Buenos
Aires and Montevideo), the most important harbors of the region, and many industrial poles are
located on its coasts. Moreover, the estuary constitutes the main source of drinking water for the
millions of inhabitants in the region. As a consequence the river is constantly under pressure from
human activities and environmental changes. Current global ocean color sensors such as MODIS
provides medium resolution (250 and 500 m) imagery for coastal applications, however for certain
studies finer resolution is required. In this study, we analyzed the capability of sensors originally
designed for land observations for detecting fine scale structures in the turbid waters of RdP. The
quality of the retrieved reflectance and turbidity values from Landsat 8/OLI (30 m) and Pléiades (2 m)
are assessed using in situ measurements. Then we explored different features that can be identified by
sensors with increasing spatial resolution and their potential usefulness for different applications such
as: a) providing quantitative information for sediment transport studies to understand the pattern of the
main tributaries plumes located the along the RdP estuary, b) identifying features produced by small
scale water discharges, c) detecting near shore currents, and d) identifying complex hydrodynamic
features in the maximum turbidity zone.
1
Instituto de Astronomía y Física del Espacio (IAFE), CONICET/UBA, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
adogliotti@iafe.uba.ar; gossn@iafe.uba.ar
2
Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS), Operational Directorate Natural Environment.
Brussels, Belgium. quinten. vanhellemont@mumm.ac.be; k.ruddick@mumm.ac.be
3
4
Departamento de Ciencias de la Atmósfera y los Océanos, (FCEN/UBA). Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Centro de Investigaciones del Mar y la Atmósfera (CIMA/CONICET-UBA). Buenos Aires,
Argentina. moreira@cima.fcen.uba.ar; simionato@cima.fcen.uba.ar