High-resolution digital elevation models and orthomosaics generated from historical aerial photographs (since the 1960s) of the Bale Mountains in Ethiopia

This dataset contains the results of photogrammetric processing (Digital Elevation Models, Orthomosaics and  subset data used for volumetric calculation and visualization) named: “DEM_1967.7z”: inside the zipped folder “1967_DEM.tif” (digital elevation model produced for the year 1967), “DEM_1984.7z”: inside the zipped folder “1984_DEM.tif” exist (digital elevation model produced for the year 1984). In addition, under “1967_Orthomosaic.7z" and "1984_Orthomosaic.7z” zipped folders, there are orthomosaic files produced namely, “1967_orthomosaic.tif” and "1984_orthomosaic.tif” for the year 1967 and 1984, respectively. The DEMs and Orthomosaics  subset from the results for sites (data example 1 and data example 2) reside under "Data_Examples.zip". Accuracy of the resulted data were assessed and the extracted elevation values are under "Accuracy_assessment.zip".  All DEMs and Orthomosaics are in GeoTIFF format in the Adindan UTM Zone 37 N (EPSG: 20137) projected coordinate system.

    Potential application of the presented dataset include:

1. watershed management

2. analyses of historical landscape change

3. detailed mapping and analyses of geological and archaeological features, as well as natural resources

4. analyses of geomorphological processes

5. socioecological patterns and dynamics

6. modelling and planning for telecommunications 

7. biodiversity research. 

The inputs for the above resulted DEMs and Orthomosaics are found under Zenodo repository "10.5281/zenodo.7271617".