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A. Jaspersen:
"Mapping the Relief of Mount Ushba (Georgia) as a Contribution to an Alpine Club Map";
Supervisor: N. Prechtel, G. Gartner; Department of Aerospace and Geodesy, Technical University of Munich, 2021; final examination: 11-19-2021.

Characterized by its double summit, Mount Ushba (Georgia) is one of the most prominent peaks of the Caucasus Mountains. Tourism has been growing in the Mestia region over the past couple of years, with many hikers visiting the region. This led the Alpine Club to create a map sheet focusing on the hiking possibilities of the Caucasus region around Mount Ushba and Mestia, with a target scale of 1:33,000. This project is carried out together with the Technical University of Dresden. This master thesis focuses on mapping the relief of Mount Ushba (Georgia) as a Contribution to this Alpine Club Map. Using high-resolution PlanetScope Imagery a digital elevation model of the area is generated and evaluated. The Dove-1 satellites image the entire world´s landmass every day, and are therefore a valuable source for studying dynamic phenomena. The results are evaluated by comparing statistics of the elevation differences between a 30-meter resolution SRTM DEM, map sheets of the region and field measurements taken during a mapping campaign in the summer of 2021 and the PlanetScope DEM. The RMSE of the elevation differences between the generated PlanetScope DEM and the STRTM is 46.9m and 14m over stable terrain. For the elevation difference with the map sheets the RMSE is 36.8m and the RMSE is 14.3m for the field measurements. These deviations are rather large due to the mountainous terrain, but the PlanetScope DEM performs better in most accuracy assessments than the commonly used SRTM DEM. The results show that it is possible to generate a DEM of sufficient quality with the PlanetScope imagery. Based on this DEM a relief depiction is created. After carefully smoothing the DEM, contour lines can be drawn. The shaded relief is produced with Blender and the rock depiction is made in the Swiss style using the software by Roman Geisthövel.

Photogrammetric DEM, PlanetScope images, rock drawing, contour lines, scree depiction, Caucasus, Alpine Club Map