Nearly all communities in Western, Interior, and Northern Alaska are experiencing some form of erosion or subsidence from melting permafrost, extreme weather events, and other symptoms of a warming climate. Many of these impacts to the landscape and the infrastructure it supports are measurable through remote-sensing tools, including USA-made drones. Please join our TTAP webinar to hear from Dr. Jessica Garron about her team’s work in Western Alaska integrating placed-based knowledge and drone technology to build local capacity in community mapping for decision-making about climate change adaptation strategies, economic development, as well as search and rescue support. Dr. Jessica Garron works with a broad spectrum of scientists, community members, agency partners and industry representatives to apply science-based solutions to decision-making. Jessica works to holistically integrate actionable knowledge about the Arctic into current and future Alaskan operations and policy, and to tie the motivations of climate security needs to the Arctic research mission and Alaska Native Tribal communities along the Western edge of North America. Garron’s primary work identifies remote sensing and drone-based technological solutions to address community, scientific and operational problems focused on the circumpolar Arctic and to serve as a knowledge broker of those solutions. In her roles as research faculty at the International Arctic Research Center, Adjunct Professor with the US Army War College, and as the Deputy Director of the Alaska Climate Adaptation Science Center, she connects operational and community-based end users with actionable, geospatial, and model-based science information to support climate change adaptation planning and response.
The Western Alaska Drone Community of Practice