Shallow water depths were estimated using Compact Airborne Spectrographic Imager (CASI)-1500 and mapped to analyze the bottom bathymetry changes due to the rip currents in Haeundae beach, South Korea for the first time. The depths were estimated empirically using the maximum reflectances from 420nm to 597nm wavelength of CASI and 47 in situ water depth measurements, which were compared with ground-truth bathymetry measurements. The comparisons showed that the RMSE was 1.1m with a correlation

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... fficient of 0.76. In addition, CASI imagery showed remarkably detailed bottom features, especially those resulting from the rip currents within the beach. Two different channels carved by the rip current were analyzed and characterized with respect to the width and slope compared to surrounding regions. While the west side of the channel showed a wide and gentle slope, the east side of the channel showed a narrow and steep slope. The estimated bathymetry map revealed that the uneven offshore bottom features were related to the transport and accumulation of sediments by the rip current, which reaches hundreds of meters offshore. Accordingly, the accumulated sediments were estimated by adding topography changes compared to the depths of the non-rip current regions. The sediments were accumulated in off channels as much as almost twice the amount of annual sand supplements along the Haeundae beach.