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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 10/07/2026

Why are we organizing this? To push forward a new initiative: making life-saving ground motion data available worldwide, especially where it’s needed most.

Partial globe showing coverage by the European Ground Motion Service, showing dense deformation measurements. Highlights how some regions have access to life-saving data, while most of the world does not.

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My first thought is that this could be very useful for disaster response. But the military has far deeper pockets and this will be priced accordingly.

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 02/07/2026

Honestly can't be bothered to fight with that pathetic Canada Post verification system. Can't even use a Canadian passport as the photo id?

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 21/05/2026

The lawn chair in my backyard is visible from space 😆

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 26/04/2026

So close to NORSAR headquarters? Sounds like an inside job! 😏

Examples are very welcome—but so are contributions that highlight gaps. Where would a sustained, open ground motion service make a real difference? Where are we still missing coverage, continuity, or access? That’s very much part of the discussion we hope to have.

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I’d especially like to highlight Session 2.2. This session steps back a bit and looks at the bigger picture: Do we need continental or even global #InSAR - based ground motion services to support disaster risk reduction? (Answer is YES).

Image showing the names and faces of the convenors of Session 2.2, Toward continental and global InSAR ground motion services for landslide risk reduction.

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Session 2.1 focuses on advances in landslide detection and monitoring using Earth Observation. There’s room here for a wide range of approaches—InSAR, optical, data fusion, ML, early warning, etc. If you’re working on methods or applications, this is a good fit.

Image showing the names and faces of the convenors of Session 2.1, Advances in EO-based landslide detection and monitoring.

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 15/04/2026

Just under two weeks left to submit abstracts to the 7th World Landslide Forum (WLF7), to be held in India in November 2026. I’d like to draw attention to a couple of #InSAR #DRR sessions that may be of interest: wlf7.org/themes-sessi...

Poster showing that the 7th World Landslide Forum abstract submission deadline has been extended to April 30, 2026.

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Nice summary of our new #InSAR Svalbard service by the Norwegian Space Agency (in Norwegian). Still just five pilot areas but we are scaling up to the full territory over the next years. romdirektoratet.no/aktuelt/insa...

romdirektoratet.no

Viser bakkebevegelser på Svalbard

InSAR Svalbard viser hvor mye grunnen beveger seg når permafrosten tiner.

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 05/04/2026

I love that it has the toilet status!

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 19/03/2026

I remember a road trip from Winnipeg to New York in the late 80s. At the Minnesota border, on a snowy November day, we had to open our luggage outside in the cold while my friend explained all his transplant meds. The only difference from previous uneventful trips? My friend was of Indian origin.

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 17/03/2026

I have a joke about InSAR but it's only funny after unwrapping.

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 02/03/2026

And this is exactly why we need global ground motion services. Large, slow-moving slope systems don’t respect borders — and millimetre-scale deformation beneath real communities demands systematic, open, long-term #InSAR monitoring at continental to global scale. #DRR

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 02/03/2026

The Leo Pargil DSGSD isn’t just remote alpine terrain. ~1,000+ people live within or directly on the deforming slope system (Nako, Malling, Liyo), and NH-505 crosses it. Millimetres per year — beneath real villages and a critical Himalayan lifeline.

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 02/03/2026

This is a big one, literally. New paper out in Geomorphology: we use multi-geometry Sentinel-1 InSAR to unravel the internal kinematic segmentation of a 55 km² deep-seated landslide in the NW Himalaya. www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... #DRR #InSAR #Sentinel-1 #landslide

Fig. 9. Conceptual and geological framework relevant to slope deformation at the Leo Pargil Dome. (a) Conceptual scheme illustrating gravity-driven zones of extension and compression on a steep ridge, after Savage and Varnes (1987). (b) Simplified geological cross-section and block diagram of the Leo Pargil Dome, showing the regional structural architecture and extensional setting, after Thiede et al. (2006). (c) Northwest-oriented geological cross-section across the western flank of the Leo Pargil Dome at the latitude of Nako village, highlighting major lithological units and extensional structures, after Langille et al. (2012).

Fig. 6. Decomposition of LOS velocities into 2D displacement rates using an extended colour scale. (a) East–west horizontal and (b) vertical velocity fields inverted from paired Sentinel-1 ascending and descending LOS velocity fields (2018–2023).

Fig. 5. Decomposition of LOS velocities into 2D displacement rates using a narrow colour scale. (a) East–west horizontal and (b) vertical velocity fields inverted from paired Sentinel-1 ascending and descending LOS velocity fields (2018–2023).

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 09/02/2026

Not quite. The red dots in your image are from below the town. If you enable Calibrated layers (higher resolution) and zoom in on the area that has failed, there is no significant difference from the stable area. Important to turn the map in 3D to see. egms.land.copernicus.eu#llh=14.38034...,

egms.land.copernicus.eu

EGMS

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 04/01/2026

Hey #inuitart experts. I purchased this qiviut wall hanging in Yellowknife in 1993. It used to have a tag on it with the name of the artist, as well as the community she came from, but it is lost. I would very much like to know more about the artist. Does anyone recognise the signature or the style?

John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 04/11/2025

⏰ Deadline extended! The #ISPRS2026 abstract submission deadline is now 17 November. Check out our Special Session on Cooperation on Ground Motion Monitoring for DRR & Resilience 👇 www.isprs2026toronto.com/special-sess... #InSAR #DisasterRiskReduction #ISPRS2026

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 29/10/2025

Pretty low. Before the originally planned launch date for 1C, there were discussions about a possible 3 satellite constellation for some period. But at that time, both 1A and 1B were very healthy. The situation is quite different today as 1A is on it's last legs.

AnneliiD @anneliid.bsky.social · 15/10/2025

Reposted by John Dehls

Full of leading scientific institutions, Trondheim could be a natural laboratory for world-class collective transport. But progress remains constrained by car-centric policies that support electried, privately-owned cars. The thinking: Green cars = Green economic growth. A cosmetic solution.

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 13/10/2025

On this International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction, iddrr.undrr.org, I'd like to call attention once again to our idea of an InSAR-based global ground motion service, and our upcoming special session at ISPRS in Toronto. Abstract deadline is Nov 3. www.isprs2026toronto.com/special-sess...

iddrr.undrr.org

International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction (IDDRR)

Financing is the single challenge that unites the disaster, climate, development, and humanitarian domains. The unique advantage of disaster risk reduction is that it can simultaneously strengthen all the other domains, because of its emphasis on reducing vulnerabilities and building resilience.

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 26/09/2025

Absolutely. Hydropower dams worldwide face similar risks—yet most have no satellite-based monitoring at all. Time to change that. Join us at #ISPRS2026 Toronto and help make the case for global ground motion services. bsky.app/profile/john...

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 24/09/2025

We are very much looking forward to global L-band NISAR data! But this is definitely not new! We have been doing this for several decades.

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That’s what our Special Session at #ISPRS2026 Toronto is about. Topics include: · InSAR in DRR strategies · Open services · Multi-stakeholder cooperation · Extending services to underserved regions

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The tools exist to build a Global Ground Motion Service. Open #SAR missions like #Copernicus #Sentinel-1 and NASA/ISRO’s #NISAR can already track vast areas. What’s missing is cooperation.

Groundwater & infrastructure: Subsidence in California or Spain’s Guadalentín Valley shows how over-extraction damages farmland, cities, and flood defences. InSAR makes the invisible visible.

European Ground Motion Service map of the Guadalentín Valley, Spain. InSAR deformation points show a gradient from green (stable) to red (strong subsidence), revealing land sinking caused by intensive groundwater extraction in agricultural areas.

Mining & tailings dams: InSAR highlights deformation at sites like Uzbekistan. Failures can release toxins, devastate ecosystems, and take lives. Many risks are preventable if we act early.

Satellite image of a large tailings dam in Uzbekistan. InSAR deformation data shows a red band around the dam walls, indicating significant ground movement.

Glacial Lake Outburst Floods (GLOFs): InSAR detected precursory deformation at South Lhonak Lake before its catastrophic 2023 flood. These events cascade far downstream. (www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...)

Satellite view of South Lhonak Lake in the Himalayas, overlaid with InSAR deformation data. Red and orange zones along the moraine show precursory ground movement before the catastrophic 2023 glacial lake outburst flood.

Here are three examples from San Juan Province, Argentina, highlighted by #InSAR. These slow-moving landslides affect large, high-relief mountain slopes and demonstrate the value of regional-scale monitoring for identifying potential geohazards in remote areas where on-the-ground access is limited.

Satellite images of steep mountain slopes in Argentina. Top row shows natural-colour terrain. Bottom row overlays InSAR ground deformation data, with red areas marking active slope movement, highlighting large, slow-moving landslides across the region.

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But what about the rest of the world? Most regions still don’t have access to this kind of critical information. Too often, where hazards are highest, monitoring is weakest. That gap must close.

#InSAR is a proven technology for disaster risk reduction—and it scales. Examples like InSAR Norway insar.ngu.no and the European Ground Motion Service already provide billions of open measurements.

Image from InSAR Norway showing a fjord with mountainsides. The mountainsides are coloured red where unstable slopes are moving.

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Why are we organizing this? To push forward a new initiative: making life-saving ground motion data available worldwide, especially where it’s needed most.

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ISPRS 2026 Special Sessions

I’d like to call your attention to a Special Session Drew Rotheram-Clarke (GSC) and I are co-chairing at #ISPRS2026 Toronto: 👉 “Cooperation on Ground Motion Monitoring for Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience.” 👉 www.isprs2026toronto.com/special-sess... #DRR #InSAR

isprs2026toronto.com

Discover ISPRS 2026 Special Sessions – expert-led, in-depth discussions on emerging topics in photogrammetry, remote sensing, and spatial information sciences.

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John Dehls @john.dehls.net · 30/07/2025

Figure taken from www.isro.gov.in/media_isro/p...

isro.gov.in