Remote Sensing and GIS Applications for Assessing Flood Vulnerability of Cultural Heritage Sites in Hue City, Central Vietnam

Reserving Cultural Heritage (CH) sites from natural hazards necessitates advanced risk assessment and management techniques. This study employs Remote Sensing (RS) and GIS integrated with the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) to evaluate the flood vulnerability of CH sites in Hue City, Central Vietnam. The comprehensive model constructed for this purpose incorporates a wide range of variables such as elevation, slope, aspect, curvature, distance from the river, Land Use Land Cover (LULC), Topographic Roughness Index (TRI), Topographic Wetness Index (TWI), Sediment Transport Index (STI), and Stream Power Index (SPI). These variables have been chosen based on their proven impact on flood dynamics and their relevance in the topographic and landscape context of Hue City. The flood risk map produced has been validated on the flood event of 2020 EMRS472 (Copernicus Emergency) providing a robust framework for the analysis. The results reveal that UNESCO-listed heritage assets in Hue City show varying degrees of vulnerability, reflecting the critical need for targeted flood risk mitigation strategies.