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- Iturralde home page > Ground Truthing
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Ground Truthing
The acquisition of earth images from the sky has revolutionized
the understanding of weather and other earth systems. But images
must be interpreted and an image is not reality. The process of
verifying what an image really represents is called ground truthing.
For example, in a weather image that shows certain pixels as white,
it isn’t obvious whether the white represents snow, ice, fog,
or clouds. Ground truthing in that case would involve going to
the area or calling someone there to find out what was happening
at the time of the image production.
The Landsat image of the Iturralde structure in 1985 revealed
a circular pattern that conditions created when that image was
produced by the instrumentation. The mission to the Iturralde
structure is the attempt to provide ‘ground truth’ and, in the
process, ascertain whether or not the structure is indeed the
result of a meteor impact.
So what needs to be done to ground truth at the Iturralde structure?
The scientists will engage in numerous activities many of which
would fall in the following categories :
• magnetometer readings
• survey of flora and fauna
• collection of soil samples
• obtaining core samples
• acquisition of mineral and rock specimens
For a detailed treatment of ground truthing this url is an excellent source.