Three years of weekly DEMs, aerial orthomosaics and surveyed shoreline positions at Waikīkī Beach, Hawai‘i

• Published in: Scientific data Vol. 11; no. 1; pp. 324 - 8
• Main Authors: Mikkelsen, Anna B., McDonald, Kristian K., Kalksma, Julianne, Tyrrell, Zachary H., Fletcher, Charles H.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 29.03.2024; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 704/106/694/1108; 704/172/4081; 706/2808; Beaches; Data Descriptor; Humanities and Social Sciences; multidisciplinary; Polls & surveys; Quality control; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Shorelines; Surveys
• ISSN: 2052-4463; 2052-4463
• DOI: 10.1038/s41597-024-03160-z

In this dataset, we present 128 coastal surveys conducted between 2018 and 2021 at Kahaloa Beach, also known as the Royal Hawaiian Beach, in Waikīkī, Hawai‘i. Surveys were conducted on a near-weekly basis, providing a 0.5 m digital elevation model, an orthorectified image mosaic with 0.03 m resolution, and shoreline vectors at MHHW and MSL, along with a surveyed shoreline position for each survey. We captured overlapping images using a small Unoccupied Aerial System (sUAS), processing the imagery with photogrammetric software to produce orthomosaics and Digital Terrain Models (DTM). Simultaneously, the shoreline position and reference points for sUAS-derived products were surveyed using total station and rod-mounted surveying prism. A quality assessment of 424 randomly sampled points across two surveys showed normally distributed errors of DTM elevations (µ 1  = 0.0060 m; σ 1  = 0.0998 m; µ 2  = 0.0035 m; σ 2  = 0.0680). Elevation uncertainties were quantified as 95% confidence intervals (±0.0130 m and ±0.0095 m). These data are intended to encourage research on reef-fringed beaches and provide a dataset for evaluating the accuracy of satellite-derived shorelines at reef-fringed beaches.