10th February 2025
Circular 2 of 2025
To all Registered Foresters and Stakeholders
Availability of Free Satellite Imagery – and tutorial for assessing windblow damage
Further to the recent storm damage to forests in Ireland the Department would like to make you aware of the availability of Sentinel-2 satellite imagery to facilitate mapping and damage assessments of forests. These satellite images are provided free of charge and are openly accessible to everyone from the European Commission’s Copernicus Browser*.
The Department has issued a short guidance video on the use of the Copernicus Browser to view Sentinel-2 satellite imagery which can be accessed here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hqqy5sP8PzY
To access the full suite of tools available from Copernicus Browser it is recommended that you register for an account (rather than accessing anonymously). The Copernicus Browser and registration for a Copernicus Browser (Copernicus Data Space Ecosystem) account can be accessed be entering ‘copernicus browser’ into Google.
Separately the Department and Coillte are collaborating on producing a dataset of all damaged areas using satellite imagery.
Vincent Byrne
Assistant Principal
*The Copernicus Data Space Ecosystem Browser or Copernicus Browser serves as a central hub for accessing, exploring and utilising the wealth of Earth observation and environmental data provided by the Copernicus Sentinel constellations, contributing missions, Auxiliary engineering data, on-demand data and more.