By: Amna Alruheili

This study focuses on quantifying shoreline change through the use of remote sensing techniques, multi-temporal Landsat images, on the southern region of Oman’s coast (Dhofar, Salalah). The coastal shoreline of Dhofar Governance witnessed a major cyclone in 2002. As a result, morphological changes including the accretion and erosion of the coastline along Salalah took place.

In this study, coastline changes were researched using radiometrically and geometrically corrected multitemporal and multi-spectral data from Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) dated 1984 and 1998, Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) 2002, and Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) and Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIRS) dated 2015. In the image processing steps, band rationing (B4/B2) and digitizing were used to carry out coastline extraction, and the Digital Shoreline Analysis System was used to calculate the rate of coastline changes. In some parts of the research area, remarkable coastline changes of more than 56.4 m withdrawal and -0.9 m/year erosion were observed in 2002.