Automating Pipeline Right-of-Way Monitoring with Site Sentry
Pipeline operators face a persistent challenge: federal regulations require visual inspection of every mile of pipeline infrastructure every 14-21 days. For networks spanning thousands of kilometers, this creates significant operational burden. Traditional aerial patrols are episodic, resource-intensive, and difficult to scale consistently across large networks. Pilots look out the window, note observations by hand, and if something is missed, the window closes until the next flight cycle.
When PHMSA recognized satellite imagery as an acceptable method for pipeline right-of-way (ROW) patrols in October 2025, it opened a new path to compliance. But satellite-based monitoring requires more than just imagery—it demands the right data foundation and accurate intelligent analysis.
Vantor's monitoring solution is two-fold:
- Access to the industry's most capable commercial satellite constellation, with six new high-powered satellites delivering aerial-comparable resolution and unmatched collection capacity
- Site Sentry™, an AI-powered monitoring platform that automatically analyzes incoming imagery, detects change, and flags activity that matters across entire pipeline networks
Make sense of millions of data points over thousands of miles
The goal: accelerate threat detection across thousands of kilometers of pipeline, enabling operators to deploy field crews only when and where anomalies are detected.
Site Sentry goes beyond traditional satellite imagery observation by automating analysis on years-worth of spatial data to create a validated baseline of site activity. When new imagery is ingested, automated detection layers work together to flag activity across the entire network.
This is what we mean by persistent monitoring: maintaining continuous awareness of change over time by pairing frequent collection with automated analysis. Operators configure monitoring zones once, establish their imaging cadence, tailor their thresholds for alerts, and let the system watch for them. When relevant activity occurs, operators get actionable intelligence tied to specific locations, equipment, and timeframes. All of which can be included in their compliance documentation.
The shift satellite-based persistent monitoring enables is verification at scale. Rather than treating all observed activity as equal, Site Sentry establishes a baseline of normal conditions and automatically flags meaningful change as new imagery is collected. This decision clarity reduces the need for unnecessary patrol effort and supports more deliberate field deployment—directing crews only where follow-up is warranted.
Lake Charles demonstration
Vantor configured Site Sentry to monitor a section of pipeline in Louisiana. The analyst started the project by creating a new location in the interface, specifying a date range from 2021 to present, and activating the detection layers relevant to right-of-way activity.
The date range selector lets you choose a specific timeframe for analysis. For a large pipeline AOI like this, imagery is received over 2-3 weeks as different satellites pass over different sections. The system can provide insights incrementally as data arrives or wait for complete coverage—analyst's choice.
From broad coverage to specific signals
Over the thousands of miles of collection, this area stood out immediately. The Building and Road Change layer tracked directly to the path of trenching activity. This automated flagging narrowed the analyst's focus from the entire network to a small number of locations requiring investigation.
Using Site Sentry's timeline feature, the analyst reviewed historical imagery and identified the source of the change: 55 excavators on-site supporting perpendicular pipeline construction, along with dozens of vehicles and equipment staging areas. All automatically detected and categorized.
In this scene, our object detection models identified 3,815 vehicles and construction equipment with approximately 99% accuracy in a real-world, complex scene.
The Sentinel-1 SAR-based heat map flagged this location as a high-change area, while object detection models confirmed what equipment was present and when activity peaked. An analyst who might otherwise have spent hours manually reviewing imagery instead had immediate clarity on where to focus attention.
Site Sentry also detected new storage silos, cleared earth, and building construction. Each of these findings triggered alerts based on thresholds configured by the user.
From detection to action
Site Sentry's annotation tools allow teams to add shared context directly in the interface—labels such as "Equipment Staging Area" or "Cleared Earth"—that can be referenced across teams or included in compliance records.
The monitoring and alerts system enables threshold-based notifications, such as "Alert if more than 5 excavators appear" or "Notify when ground change exceeds 10%." Alerts are generated only when thresholds are met, reducing noise and focusing attention to what matters. For field operations, this means dispatching crews to precise, verified locations.
Integration flexibility
Operators can use Site Sentry through its purpose-built interface or integrate detections and alerts directly into GIS, pipeline management, or SCADA systems via API.
The multi-site dashboard provides a single view across entire pipeline networks, highlighting which segments have detected changes and where attention is required. For high-priority locations, Vantor’s industry-leading constellation supports dawn-to-dusk collection with up to 15 revisits per day, enabling tighter monitoring when conditions demand it.
Get started with automated monitoring
In the Lake Charles demonstration, an analyst was alerted to potential construction activity via automated change detection, reviewed thousands of accurate object detections, tracked activity across multiple time periods, and pinpointed exactly where field teams needed to investigate—all within minutes of accessing the data.
The regulatory framework now affirms the use of satellite-derived inputs. The technology is production-ready. Pipeline operators can augment existing inspection programs with automated, persistent monitoring today.
Learn more about Sentry at https://vantor.com/product/mission-solutions/sentry/