Detection of buried human bodies using ground-penetrating radar method

Abstract

Indonesia is a country that often experiences natural disasters as it is a meeting point of several tectonic plates. When a natural disaster occurs, most of the time the evacuation team having some trouble finding the buried victims underground. The Ground-Penetrating Radar (GPR) method is one of the solutions for this problem. GPR or also called georadar is a geophysical method that is used to investigate conditions under the earth’s surface using electromagnetic waves. This study aims to detect buried human bodies underground using the GPR method to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of natural disaster victims by doing a simulation measurement. It took place in one of the public cemeteries in Jakarta, Indonesia passing two graves with corpses buried around three years before the survey. GPR measurements were conducted using Geoscanners AKULA A9000+ Antenna GCB3070 to detect the buried human bodies underground. The GPR data then processed using MATLAB based program called matGPR. A series of adjustments and filters such as signal position adjustment, remove DC, mean filter, inverse amplitude decay, remove global background, and Karhunen-Loeve (KL) filter have been applied to the data. The result of data processing shows amplitude contrasts which are suspected to be the buried corpses. Further research can be conducted to investigate the buried victims from landslides, earthquakes, and other natural disasters.

Application of ground-penetrating radar method to detect underground pipes in PAIR BATAN utility area

“…The iron pipe will show an obvious reflection amplitude in the GPR profile due to its high dielectric constant difference from the surrounding subsurface medium [4]. Previous studies show that groundpenetrating radar methods have been implemented to identify buried human bodies [5] and water seepage in lake bodies [6]. This present study performs GPR in detecting underground pipelines around the PAIR-BATAN area to be used as a mapping reference for further utility development.…”

Detection of subsurface water pipeline under SZJT Track Using Ground-Penetrating Radar Method

“…The Georadar technique was deployed to detect septic tanks [5], to detect seepage around water catchment reservoirs in Jakarta [6], and to be used in disaster mitigation. GPR is also applied to detect buried victims [7]. Moreover, many investigators are applying and developing more sophisticated algorithms to reveal subsurface objects, such as the so-called Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) [8].…”