Geospatial Analysis of Indus River Meandering and Flow Pattern from Chachran to Guddu Barrage, Pakistan

Abstract

Natural and anthropogenic influence affects directly ecologic equilibrium and hydro morphologic symmetry of riverine surroundings. The current research intends to study the hydro morphologic features (meanders, shape, and size) of Indus River, Pakistan by using remote sensing (RS) and geographical information science (GIS) techniques to calculate the temporal changes. Landsat satellite imagery was used for qualitative and analytical study. Satellite imagery was acquired from Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM), Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) and Operational Land Imager (OLI). Temporal satellite imagery of study area was used to identify the variations of river morphology for the years 1988,1995,2002,2009 and 2017. Research was based upon the spatial and temporal change of river pattern with respect to meandering and flow pattern observations for 30 years’ temporal data with almost 7 years’ interval. Image preprocessing was applied on the imagery of the study area for the better visualization and identification of variations among the objects. Object-based image analysis technique was performed for better results of a feature on the earth surface. Model builder (Arc GIS) was used for calculation of temporal variation of the river. In observation many natural factor involves for pattern changes such as; floods and rain fall. The object-oriented classification was applied for land use/land cover (LULC) features of the study area for the years 1988 and 2017 and abrupt change observed. Overall, 1988 to 2017 the Indus River in the study area has changed its path and pattern.