INTEGRATING NASA'S GEDI AND LANDSAT 8 OLI DATA FOR REGIONAL ABOVEGROUND BIOMASS MAPPING IN FORESTED AREAS IMPACTED BY HURRICANE IAN IN FLORIDA

The occurrence of hurricanes in the Southern U.S. is increasingly frequent and quantifying the damage caused to forests is crucial to assist in protection measures and understanding the dynamics of recovery. The aim of this study is to develop a data fusion framework based on NASA's GEDI (Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation) and Landsat 8 OLI for mapping aboveground biomass density (AGBD, Mg/ha) that can be further used to damage severity and recovery in forested ecosystems impacted by Hurricane Ian in Florida. We used GEDI level 4A and L8 data for calibrating a Random Forest (RF) for predicting and mapping AGBD at four-months pre-Hurricane Ian disturbance across areas impacted by Hurricane Ian. The RF model showed good performance with R-2 = 0.79, absolute and relative RMSE of 29.17 Mg/ha (64.27%) and Bias of -1.14 Mg/ha (2.66%), respectively. This research highlights methodological opportunities for fusing GEDI and L8 data streams toward improved AGB mapping and for assessing the impact of Hurricane Ian disturbance in Florida through data fusion.