Nearshore Bathymetry Based on ICESat-2 and Multispectral Images: Comparison Between Sentinel-2, Landsat-8, and Testing Gaofen-2

Accurate bathymetric maps are essential to understand marine and coastal ecosystems. With the development of satellite and sensor technology, satellite-derived bathymetry (SDB) has been widely used to measure the depth of nearshore waters. Employment of physics-based methods requires a series of optical parameters of the water column and seafloor, which limits the application of these methods to shallow-water bathymetry. Due to convenience, low costs, and high efficiency, empirical methods based on
in situ
measurements and satellite imagery are increasingly used for nearshore bathymetry. These measurements are required to calibrate empirical models, so that reasonable accuracy can be achieved. The Ice, Cloud, and Land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2), equipped with the advanced topographic laser altimeter system, provides a novel opportunity for nearshore bathymetry. Using the new measurement strategy of photon counting, ICESat-2 can provide accurate bathymetric points from spaceborne observations, which can be used in place of
in situ
water depth data. In this study, ICESat-2 bathymetric points and multispectral images were used to train four typical models and produce bathymetric maps for Shanhu Island, Ganquan Island, and Lingyang Reef in the Xisha Islands of China. We evaluated the bathymetric results by comparing them with reference depth data from airborne light detection and ranging. All models had a satisfactory accuracy, as well as multimodel and multisource image consistency. With the ICESat-2 bathymetric points, SDB is no longer limited by
in situ
measurements. Hence, this approach could be extended to a larger scale to obtain nearshore bathymetric maps of coastal areas, surrounding islands, and reefs using free and open-access satellite data.