Dare County uses monthly drone mapping to track coastal erosion

Dare County added monthly drone mapping of Buxton and Rodanthe between periodic state aerial surveys. It also published a GIS viewer that lets users compare shoreline imagery across dates.

More current imagery gives county staff and residents a shared record of erosion near homes and North Carolina Highway 12. It can help document mitigation work, but mapping alone cannot accelerate relocation and acquisition processes that the source says take years.

Dare County’s two-person GIS team has added recurring drone surveys to track shoreline changes that state aerial imagery could not capture quickly enough. State surveys typically occurred every four years, with processed imagery reaching the county nearly a year after capture. GIS analyst Kristen Stilson now flies Buxton and Rodanthe at least monthly and documents other county areas quarterly. An interactive viewer compares imagery from different dates, including October 2025 and February 2026, showing disappearing homes and the shoreline moving toward remaining properties. The county reports 2,000 views on the app’s first publicized day, alongside imagery requests from tax, planning, grants and county management staff. The operational change is a shorter observation cycle for a rapidly changing coast. The imagery supports documentation and public communication, with plans to record beach nourishment before and after construction. It does not remove the funding and timing constraints facing relocation, property acquisition or shoreline protection.

Evidence supplied by Esri.