362
May 2015
PHOTOGRAMMETRIC ENGINEERING & REMOTE SENSING
INDUSTRY
NEWS
To have your press release published in
PE&RS
, contact Rae Kelley,
.
ANNOUNCEMENT
is pleased to announce that
Lewis Graham, President and Chief
Technology Officer of
and Mark Whorton, Ph.D., Chief
Technologist of
will be the
keynote speakers for
.
Mr. Graham will
kick off ILSC on
June 9 with an in-
depth look at the
current state of
small
unmanned
aerial systems (UAS)
and their practical
business use for airborne surveying.
While expectations for these versatile
systems are rising, their deployment
costs can be high and their place in
the surveying world remains unclear.
Mr. Graham will get attendees up to
speed on the rapidly changing small
UAS market, including the current
state of reliable hardware platforms
and the instrument types available
for installation. He will then delve
into the business aspects of using a
small UAS, examining what kinds
of problems are amenable to being
solved, how they can fit into current
workflows, and how companies
will need to change their business
models to accommodate this quickly
evolving technology. This keynote
complements a wider discussion of
small UAS business cases, processing
challenges and trends on June 9,
plus two demonstration flights of the
Optech XR6 UAV on June 10 and 12.
On June 11, Dr.
Mark Whorton will
discuss howTBE has
worked with NASA
to put a facility for
swappable
earth-
imaging
systems
on the ISS as part
of the first generation of commercial
space-based earth imagers. The Multi-
PENNSYLVANIA CELEBRATES
NATIONAL SURVEYORS’ WEEK
P
ennsylvania Society of Land Surveyors
(PSLS) is proud to announce its
involvement in National Surveyors’ Week,
March 15-21, 2015, through its Reaching
New Heights project. To support this effort,
Gov. Tom Wolf has honored Pennsylvania
surveyors through a proclamation
recognizing surveyors’ contributions to local
communities across the commonwealth.
The proclamation states in part “land
surveyors provide exceptional service to our
communities, or Commonwealth, and our
nation…”
The primary goal of Reaching New Heights is to eliminate or reduce large
areas in Pennsylvania with poor elevation accuracy. For the second straight
year volunteers from PSLS performed GPS observations on at least 100 bench
marks and provide the observations to the National Geodetic Survey who
refined the elevation model in Pennsylvania. In 2014, over 70 individuals
representing over 45 companies and agencies contributed to the effort
resulting in 50 updated bench mark elevations.
Surveyors have played a vital role in the development of towns, cities, and the
nation. They provide the client with a wealth of information. The information
provided by surveyors is the source from which clients obtain details utilized
from commencement to completion of projects ranging from creating residential
boundaries to large-scale commercial construction, as well as identifying
environmental concerns, and managing floodplain control.
PSLS contacted its members throughout the commonwealth to aid in locating
and observing GPS elevations on benchmarks for comparison to traditional
elevations. Students from Penn State, Wilkes-Barre and Pennsylvania College
of Technology will also participate and be able to use the experience in their
projects. The students’ involvement in PSLS gives them practical experience
and mentorship, and emphasizes the importance of participating in professional
organizations.
“PSLS was excited to be working statewide to collect data that will be utilized
within the National Geodetic Survey. To help celebrate National Surveyors’
Week, the Reaching New Heights project will serve as a tool to actually
demonstrate the importance of surveying to the public. We look forward to
continuing this project for many years to collect as much data and detail as
possible,” said Adam Crews, PLS, President, PSLS Board of Directors.
For more information, visit
