An NGS delegation is chairing sessions and presenting talks this week at the American Geophysical Union 2015 Fall Meeting in San Francisco. Topics include assesing the results of a new airborne
gravimeter used in GRAV-D-NGS's inititative to redefine the nation's vertical reference system by 2022-mapping the Arctic coastal zone, and providing presentations...
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NGS recently developed an alternate method for surveyors and geodesists to perform
leveling surveys across rivers, valleys, and other barriers, and a new chapter has been added to the NGS geodetic leveling manual to describe the updated techniques...
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NGS recently compared measurements from its absolute gravimeter with those of 16 international institutions at the University of Luxembourg. As part of its
Gravity for the Redefinition of the American Vertical Datum (GRAV-D) Project, NGS is using airborne sensors to map small spatial variations in Earth's gravity. The data will eventually be used to replace mean sea level...
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An NGS Representative is in Canberra, Australia, this month to train Geosciences Australia to become the next
Analysis Center Coordinator (ACC) for the International GNSS Service...
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NOAA Chief Financial Officer Mark Seiler and NOS Acting Deputy Assistant Administrator David Holst recently joined NOAA Corps pilots and an NGS sensor operator for a demonstration flight on
NOAA's Beechcraft King Air coastal mapping and emergency response aircraft...
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Last week, NGS completed the first priority area of the topographic-bathymetric ("topo-bathy") Light Detection and Ranging (
lidar) projects in Buzzards Bay, MA for NOAA's Office of Coast Survey. The survey provides for an area that NOAA Ship
Thomas Jefferson is scheduled to survey next season...
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In mid-October, NGS's Joint Airborne Lidar Bathymetry Technical Center of Expertise (JALBTCX) mission representative and representatives from the Office of Coast Survey supported a multi-agency test in Panama City, Florida, to determine the feature detection capabilities of the Coastal Zone Mapping and Imagine lidar(CZMIL)sensor...
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Earlier this month, a major coastal storm and Hurricane Joaquin caused extensive shoreline impacts and flooding throuout the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast. NOAA's National Geodetic Survey (NGS)
collected aerial imagery beginning October 6...
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NGS provides an
antenna calibration service for GPS antenna manufacturers worldwide that lets surveyors obtain more accurate heights. Better heights are critical for applications such as floodplain mapping, evacuation route planning, construction surveys, and determining the rate of sea level change...
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NGS published the first issue of
NSRS Modernization News. Planned to be published quarterly, the newspaper will provide...
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The week of September 14, NGS surveyors determined the precise geodetic position of a commemorative bench mark that was placed at New Jersey's Absecon Inlet Lighthouse in June 2015. The marker honors 21 crew members who persihed...
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On September 10, NGS hosted a
webinar to debrief stakeholders regarding the feedback collected, and actions taken, since the April 2015 Geospatial Summit on improvements to the National Spatial Reference System held in Arlington, Virginia...
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For the first time, NGS's new Light Detection and Ranging(lidar) system was used to help the National Ocean Service's Office of Coast Survey submit a Danger to Navigation notice marking a series of uncharted shoals. New York's Snakehill Channel...
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NGS is working closely with stakeholders and professional organizations to raise awareness about the replacement of the North American Datum of 1983 (NAD 83) and the North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD 88). The Transportation Research Board and the National Society of Professional Surveyors collected input regarding NGS's activities...
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In 2022, NGS will replace the current North American Vertical Datum of 1988 with one that is based on the
geoid - a model of global mean sea level that is used to measure precise surface elevations...
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In cooperation with the COMET Program, a world leader in education and training for the environmental sciences, NGS released a new video,
Geospatial Infrastructure: Informing Adaptation to Sea Level Rise... more
Ngs has initiated a geodetic (precise positioning) survey of the Great Lakes to update the vertical reference frame (the reference system for elevation). The survey will monitor elevation changes across the Great Lakes to facilitate the development of the International Great Lakes Datum 2020...
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Four scholars from Japan, Kenya, Sri Lanka, and the Phillipines visited NGS the week of July 20 to learn about its shoreline mapping and emergency response activities. The visit was part of the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO) program, an international nonprofit...
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The week of July 13, NGS completed a site survey at the Very Long Baseline Array Observatory, located below the dormant Mauna Kea volcano in Hawaii. Two space
geodesy</a href> instruments co-located at the site, combined with the observatory's remote location... more
NGS provided training and outreach to help developing nations attain self-suffiency in monitoring volcanoes at the Center for the Study of Active Volcanoes from June 22-24. The international training program...
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From June 22 to July 2, NGS is providing updates on upcoming changes in geodetic reference frames (slated for 2022), its Gravity for the Redefinition of the American Vertical Datum (GRAV-D) project, and the agency's use of geoid studies to determine heights above sea level at the
International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) Assembly</a href> in Prague... more
Einstein's theory of general relativity states that if a clock is moved up to a location with lower gravity (for example, away from the center of the Earth), it will run faster. The effect is far too small to notice with typical clocks over small elevation changes, but scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) are developing atomic clocks with such precision that a change in height as small as two centimeters will cause a noticeable difference. To help them test and compare these clocks, NGS surveyors began performing...
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NGS recently announced the beta release of a new and improved Coordinate Transformation tool in the
NGS Geodetic Tool Kit</a href>. This redesigned version supports and provides surveyors and geodesists with a more efficient and streamlined.... more
NGS chaired sessions and presented at the Working Week of the International Federation of Surveyors held May 17-21 in Sofia, Bulgaria. The meeting brought together scientists, surveying professionals...
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NGS is supporting the State of Hawaiis new effort to dramatically modernize heights across the state, covering a total of approximately 1,001 miles with work to be completed over the next four to five years. Only four of the eight main Hawaiian Islands have any form of
leveling</a href>, and no major leveling has been performed there since the early 1970s... more
NGS, in cooperation with The COMET Program, a world leader in education and training for the environmental sciences, released a video this week that explains the difference between the U.S. survey foot (sFT) and the international survey foot (iFT), and the importance of the distincetion when working with map projections....
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The National Geodetic Survey hosted a
2015 Geospatial Summit on April 13 and 14, 2015, to share updates and receive feedback on the planned 2022 release of new geodetic datums.
Presentations and webinar videos from the event are now available on the NGS 2015 Geospatial Summit website. Visit us for more
information on the new datums and stay apprised of upcoming events by subscribing to our
listserv...
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Earlier this month, NGS collected
damage assessment imagery to support Illinois's tornado emergency response. More than 2,800 images, collected in areas impacted by multiple tornado strikes in northern Illinois, are now publicly available. The imagery will be used to help determine the extent of the damage inflicted by the storms and to compare the storm’s forecast models to the actual damage...
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NGS produced a new geoid model,
GEOID12B, to replace the previous GEOID12A model.
GEIOD12B is a height transformation model for surveyors, engineers, and others involved in water flow and the determination of heights with respect to mean sea level...
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NGS hosted a 2015 Geospatial Summit April 13-14 in Arlington, Virginia, to share updates on the 2022 release of new geodetic datums. NGS discussed the tools available to transition to the new datums and also shared strategies to enable the mapping and surveying communities to prepare for the
2022 release. Huge benefits are associated with the adoption of the new datums...
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American Surveyor Magazine published a series of articles by the National Geodetic Survey (NGS) titled "Recent Activities at the National Geodetic Survey," with one article in each of the last four issues of the magazine. The
first article discussed NGS's Ten-Year Plan, the Online Positioning User Service suite of products...
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A representative from the Canadian Geodetic Survey, National Resources Canada, visited NGS March 23-27 to discuss progress on NGS’s Gravity for the Redefinition of the American Vertical Datum (
GRAV-D) Project. Areas of mutual interest for the two countries include the border between Canada’s Yukon Territory and Alaska, the Great Lakes, Quebec, and the Maritime Provinces...
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In a collaborative effort between NGS and The COMET® Program, the first in a series of training lessons for scientists, engineers, and mapping professionals will soon be released. The lesson provides a basic understanding of vertical datums and how to choose the appropriate datum...
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This week, the National Geodetic Survey (NGS) kicked off the 2015 GPS on Bench Marks Campaign. Anyone in the nation with survey-grade GPS receivers may participate. The program is intended to raise awareness about professional surveying while improving the National Spatial Reference System (NSRS)...
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On March 5, NGS held the webinar "GPS on Bench Marks" to inform constituents about the campaign being held in conjunction with National Surveyors Week (March 15-21). More than 400 people participated...
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Greater cooperation on geodesy, the sharing of geospatial data, creation of international standards, and capacity building among nations became a reality on February 26, when the United Nations General Assembly passed the resolution "A Global Geodetic Reference Frame for Sustainable Development,"...
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National Geodetic Survey (NGS) personnel recently participated in the International Lidar Mapping Forum (ILMF) in Denver, Colorado. The ILMF is a technical conference and exhibition focused on airborne, terrestrial, and underwater light detection and ranging (lidar)...
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Using new international measurement standards and technology not available in the past, NOAA's National Geodetic Survey has calculated the official architectural height of the Washington Monument to be 554 feet 7 11/32 inches--a highly precise measurement that makes it eligible for inclusion in official registers of the world's tallest structures. NOAA's NGS provides the framework for all positioning activities in the nation...
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The National Geodetic Survey (NGS) collected
damage assessment imagery in the aftermath of the January 2015 Nor'easter that blanketed the region in snow and caused significant storm surge along the New England coast. NGS imagery covered coastal portions of...
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Rene Forsberg, professor and head of the Geodynamics Department at Denmark Technical University (DTU) Space, recently visited NGS. Forsberg is arguably the world’s leading researcher in airborne gravity for geodesy...
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From Jan. 26-27, National Geodetic Survey (NGS) Director Juliana Blackwell chaired the semi-annual meeting of the Federal Geodetic Control Subcommittee (FGCS) at the NOAA complex in Silver Spring. Representatives from across the Federal government participated...
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The National Geodetic Survey (NGS) recently loaned the City of Ukiah, California, a Wanschaff zenith telescope for display in the original observatory building where it was used for nearly a century. This zenith telescope was one of six used to observe the wobble of the Earth on its axis...
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