Hawai’i Researchers Tackle Climate Challenges in National Parks

Uni­ver­si­ty of Hawaiʻi are lead­ing an inno­v­a­tive project to pro­tect five coastal nation­al parks in Hawaiʻi from cli­mate change threats such as sea lev­el rise, storm surges, flood­ing, and ero­sion. The , fund­ed by a $1.15 mil­lion Nation­al Park Ser­vice (NPS) grant, focus­es on cul­tur­al resource preser­va­tion using high-res­o­lu­tion dig­i­tal . Pro­fes­sors Ryan Per­roy from UH Hilo and Seth Quin­tus from UH Mānoa are co-prin­ci­pal inves­ti­ga­tors, lever­ag­ing advanced tech­nolo­gies to doc­u­ment and assess cul­tur­al sites across parks Haleakalā, Kalau­pa­pa, and Puʻuhonua o Honau­nau. The study aims to enhance resilience mod­el­ing and adap­ta­tion plan­ning to safe­guard these crit­i­cal her­itage sites.

The research team employs cut­ting-edge remote sens­ing tech­niques, includ­ing drone and heli­copter-mount­ed , to col­lect pre­cise from exten­sive and hard-to-reach areas. These tools allow for effi­cient sur­vey­ing of nearshore and flood-prone regions, pro­duc­ing high-res­o­lu­tion dig­i­tal doc­u­men­ta­tion for resource mon­i­tor­ing. The project builds on pre­vi­ous doc­u­men­ta­tion efforts by the NPS and will sup­port the devel­op­ment of con­di­tion assess­ment pro­to­cols. Per­roy, an expert in aer­i­al robot­ics and geospa­tial analy­sis, over­sees the spa­tial data analy­sis lab at UH Hilo, plays a piv­otal role in address­ing envi­ron­men­tal in Hawaiʻi and the Pacif­ic.

In addi­tion to resource preser­va­tion, the project empha­sizes edu­ca­tion and train­ing by involv­ing four students—two each from UH Hilo and UH Mānoa. These stu­dents will gain hands-on expe­ri­ence in advanced remote sens­ing, includ­ing data , pro­cess­ing, and analy­sis. The ini­tia­tive not only con­tributes to cul­tur­al resource pro­tec­tion but also pre­pares future experts in envi­ron­men­tal sci­ence and geospa­tial tech­nolo­gies, equip­ping them to tack­le the impacts of cli­mate change on vul­ner­a­ble and her­itage sites.

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