Mapping Abandoned Uranium Mine Features Using Worldview-3 Imagery in Portions of Karnes, Atascosa and Live Oak Counties, Texas

Worldview-3 (WV3) 16-band multispectral data were used to map exposed bedrock and mine waste piles associated with legacy open-pit mining of sandstone-hosted roll-front uranium deposits along the South Texas Coastal Plain. We “spectral hourglass” approach extract spectral endmembers representative these features from image. This first requires calibrating imagery reflectance, then masking for vegetation, followed by spatial reduction using a principal component analysis-based procedure that reduces noise identifies homogeneous targets which are “pure” enough be considered endmembers. In this case, we single WV3 image covered an ~11.5 km ~19.5 area Karnes, Atascosa Live Oak Counties, underlain mined rocks Jackson Group Catahoula Formation. Up 58 identified further multi-dimensional class segregation method as inputs angle mapper (SAM) classification. SAM classification resulted in identification at least 117 mine- waste-related features, most previously unknown. Class similarity was evaluated, dominant minerals each comparison libraries measured samples actual host rocks. Redundant classes eliminated, run second time reduced set 23 endmembers, found same effectively full but significantly outliers. Our results validated evaluating detailed scale mapping three known sites (Esse-Spoonamore, Wright-McCrady Garbysch-Thane) published ground truth information about vegetation cover, extent erosion exposure pile materials and/or geologic lithology mineralization. Despite successful demonstration utility inventorying additional landscape such bare agricultural fields oil gas drill pads also identified. The elimination will require combining maps presented study high-quality topographic data. Also, during course could useful larger-scale efforts well-calibrated images beyond coverage our initial area.