Recent Trends and Challenges in Analysis of UAV Aerial Images for Post-Disaster Scene Understanding

Last few years have seen a tremendous increase in natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, etc., primarily due to climate change. Apart from the steps taken to mitigate climate change, there is also a need for rapid and efficient planning and management of post-disaster relief and rescue efforts. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) based system offers mobility, rapid deployment and customized flight path for surveying the disaster affected area. Therefore, images acquired from Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) may be utilized for post-disaster damage assessment. This work summarizes current methods for assessing damage after an earthquake and flood by analyzing optical UAV aerial images. Moreover, this work highlights the challenges encountered and discusses the possible way forward for a robust postdisaster scene understanding from UAV aerial images.