Deployment of real-time satellite remote sensing infrastructure to support disaster mitigation: A NATO Science for Peace collaboration project with Research Universities in Turkey, Egypt and the USA

The authors delineate the specific roles of the research partner institutions from Turkey, Egypt and the USA, in planning and implementing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Science for Peace sponsored Kamal Ewida Earth Observatory (KEEO), a network of real-time satellite remote sensing ground stations, being established over the next three years in Egypt, with a tracking station for polar orbiting satellites at Cairo University, and a networked geostationary receiving station for the European Space Agency´s Meteosat being deployed at Al Azhar University. The primary objective of the project is to facilitate early warning and mitigation of a wide range of biogenic and anthropogenic disasters. The project will also address mitigation of epidemics and epizootics, through identification and monitoring of infectious disease vector and reservoir habitat. Some examples of common concern among participating countries are climate change and its impacts, the land use problems in agriculture, air pollution problems in major cities such as Cairo and Istanbul, recent epidemics such as the bird flu, swine flu and oil spills along the seashores. Archival and real-time remote sensing and generation of near-real-time spatial data products, utilizing high performance computing clusters, are planned throughout the life cycle of disaster management, including vulnerability assessment, infrastructure safeguards, early warning, emergency response, humanitarian relief, as well as post-disaster damage assessment, reconstruction and societal recovery.