Abstract: A method for detecting aircraft surface portion characteristics including applying a marking sticker with grid markings adjacent to the aircraft surface portion, simultaneously optically detecting one region of the marking sticker and one region of the surface portion via an optical detection device, removing the optical detection device, hand guiding a sensing device to a predetermined position relative to the marking sticker within the surface portion and detecting a material characteristic there, correlating the detected material characteristic with the respective position in a data set, and generating and storing a damage map in which an optically detected structure of the surface portion is combined with the additional material characteristic at the one position, wherein guiding the sensing device includes projecting a laser line outwardly from the sensing device and moving the sensing device to align the laser line with at the grid marking.