Field campaign 2 – Budești, Argeș River, Romania

The field campaign in Budești and Soldanu localities, along the Argeș River, Romania, was carried out on 19 April 2026 as part of the ACCELERATE project use case focused on plastic waste detection. The activity was coordinated by Ionuț Șandric, Assoc. Prof., Faculty of Geography, University of Bucharest, and involved the University of Bucharest field team, students, and project collaborators. Additionanlly, seconded researcher Christos Asimakopoulos from the Harokopio University of Athens (HUA) took part as well as visiting researcer Noemi Pagano from Polytechnical University of Bari. UAV-based RGB, multispectral, and thermal imagery were collected over riverbank environments affected by visible plastic accumulation. Both nadiral and oblique flight configurations were used to capture plastic waste under different observation angles and surface conditions. The campaign targeted plastic objects located on bare ground, within vegetation, partially covered by vegetation, and close to or inside water bodies, providing representative training data for developing an AI model capable of detecting plastic litter in complex riverine landscapes.