Articles | Volume 1, issue 1
https://doi.org/10.5194/eo-1-145-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/eo-1-145-2026
© Author(s) 2026. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Comment on: “Evaluating InSAR-derived rates of surface-elevation change along the central U.S. Gulf Coast” by Li et al. (2026)
Manoochehr Shirzaei
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health, Richmond Hill, ON, Canada
UNESCO Land Subsidence International Initiative (laSII), Place de Fontenoy 7, Paris, France
Leonard Ohenhen
Department of Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, USA
Carmen Atkins
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Oluwaseyi Dasho
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Nitheshnirmal Sadhasivam
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Nivedita P. Kamaraj
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Florence Onyike
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Olasunkanmi Olorunsaye
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Esther O. Oyedele
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
Susanna Werth
Department of Geosciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health, Richmond Hill, ON, Canada
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Editorial statement
Interferometric SAR (InSAR) has been used extensively to measure vertical land motion (VLM) resulting from both natural and anthropogenic causes. Careful processing is required to produce VLM estimates with mm level precision and the processing choices have an impact on the accuracy of the resulting estimates. In this comment on a paper published in EO, the authors discuss some of those choices and their impact and, in particular, best practices for validating the accuracy of products and benchmarking. These are important issues for the whole community working on VLM using InSAR to consider and to adopt best practice.
Interferometric SAR (InSAR) has been used extensively to measure vertical land motion (VLM)...
Short summary
InSAR can map coastal sinking at fine scales. A recent paper claimed this technology is unreliable for slow subsidence, potentially undermining its policy use. We show this conclusion stems from methodological flaws: the original data were coarsened before analysis, validation used an unrepresentative Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) network, and the uncertainty threshold is self-contradictory. InSAR performs robustly and remains vital for protecting coastal communities.
InSAR can map coastal sinking at fine scales. A recent paper claimed this technology is...