Taiwan’s military plans to hire civilian vessels and aircraft to survey coastal areas where Chinese forces could attempt amphibious landings, Taipei Times reported.
The initiative would combine underwater mapping with aerial surveys to build detailed models of potential landing sites.
Military planners would use the findings to assess landing routes and identify locations for defensive mines and obstacles.
Managed by the Ministry of National Defense’s Defense Innovation Division, the project would involve private survey companies using fishing boats and other civilian vessels equipped with commercially available sensors.
Mapping Shallow Coastal Waters
The surveys would focus on areas known by Taiwanese defense planners as “red beaches,” stretches of coastline considered suitable for a Chinese amphibious assault.
These include Zhuwei in Taoyuan and Wazihwei in New Taipei City, both in northern Taiwan, as well as Sishu in the southwestern city of Tainan.
Under the proposed approach, civilian boats would use multibeam echo sounders, which calculate water depth using acoustic signals, to map shallow areas that larger naval survey vessels cannot reach.
Chartered aircraft would conduct complementary surveys using light detection and ranging.
The technology uses laser pulses to measure terrain and, with suitable equipment and conditions, shallow underwater features.
Combining the two sets of measurements would allow the military to produce three-dimensional maps showing both beach terrain and the adjoining seabed.
Civilian contractors would collect raw geographic measurements, while military units would retain responsibility for processing the information and applying it to defense plans.
That work would include combining survey results, removing measurement errors, and determining positions for counter-landing defenses.
