There’s a Bulge in Oregon

A bulge that covers about 100 square miles near the South Sister (mountain) in Oregon is growing. It may be a volcano in the making, but scientists are not sure. They believe it probably began growing in 1997 and rises a rate of about 1.4 inches a year. Radar interferometry first found it.

Police Use “Topopgraphical” Map from Internet to Nab Crooks

Apparently, the police force in Groton/Dunstable/Tyngsboro Massachusetts don’t have maps of their towns handy on patrol. So, they must download maps, topographical maps, from the Internet. I suspect it was a street map they downloaded, but whatever…it’s summer and there’s little news in these sleepy towns.

Road Map to Disaster – Forbes 9-7-2005 by Matthew Swibel

For those of you who have lived in costal locations or next to a major river, Matthew Swibel of Forbes has an interesting piece this week about how Flood Insurance or the lack of it may affect those who were victims of Katrina. Many of the maps used in insurance flood plain assessment were out of date and may not have reflected evolving Real Estate development or how it may have impacted wetlands and other areas, and perhaps even obscured what are now the real 100-year flood plain levels.

Many of the property owners impacted by Katrina may not have flood insurance or have been told they didn’t need it, as referenced by outdated maps. If their house and the land it was built on is gone, or is highly contaminated and are they not insured, this can be an economic blow very difficult to recover from. We all live with risk, but those that are known should not be ignored or worse, not be identified by old or bad data.

At the same time, as charming as New Orleans is, one has to think about the known risks in a city that is several feel below both the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi river. You also have to wonder about the technology needed to rebuild that city and what can actually be done to protect it.

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SRC Enters Google Mashup Party

SRC announced today that they are the latest to enter the Google mashup game. But this time things are getting pretty serious as the company is looking to integrate some of their business intelligence tools with the Google display engine. According to the release, SRC "will immediately release to the development community a highly
integrated of tools designed to add enhanced business intelligence
functionality with GoogleMaps." So, SRC is not just looking for another pretty face to show off their solutions. Although the company remains platform independent, the display of demographics, anywhere in the country, is pretty fast. And it will work to pull international demographic data as well, if you have subscribed to that suite of data. See the demo here. You need to click on the image when you get to the website to see a 1, 3, 5 mile buffer zone area that calculates the demographics. I encourage you to play with the demo in more than one area around the country than just the southern California area.

GIS, Maps and Katrina - Sept 7

Coverge of mapping, GIS and geospatial technologies on Sept 7.

Geotechnology Helps Get the U.S. Back in Business

“Mike da Luz, ESRIs solutions manager for forestry, fire and disaster management, said the geographic information systems (GIS) company is working with responders and relief agencies to update their software or applications. He said ESRI is also pushing out their requests, providing technical expertise to the Federal Emergency Management Agency at one of FEMAs sites, posting Web sites with names of GIS experts who are offering their services and contacting ESRIs clients in the affected area who may need assistance.
“’We don’t produce data or imagery on our own, but what were trying to do is coordinate that as [data and images] become available, and were trying to push those out to who we believe can use them in the best mode,’ he said.”
FCW.com

“Geo Strategies, based in St John’s Innovation Centre in Cowley Road [Cambridge, UK], has been called on to create specialist maps to help emergency services search for survivors and for hazard management.

“The team based its maps on a detailed analysis of latest satellite imagery of the area, which was first struck by Hurricane Katrina eight days ago.”
Cambridge Evening News Online (UK)

“LSU researchers will use satellite imagery and computer modeling to get a better fix on the quantity [of potentially toxic water in New Orleans].”
Planet Ark

“The Geospatial Information & Technology Association in Aurora [Colorado], is acting as a clearing center for emergency requests from the Gulf Coast area and for volunteers and contributions from the geographic information systems industry, which links records in a database with information displayed on maps.”
The Denver Post via Durango Herald

“To expedite the decontamination process, both [director of Duke’s integrated toxicology program] Di Giulio and Marie Miranda, an associate professor at the Nicholas School, will be aiding the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in the design of a Geographic Information System. The GIS system will be used to create map overlays plotting the locations of chemical plants and refineries, among other things, in relation to potential hot-spots of contamination where flooding has occurred.”
The Chronicle Online (Duke University)

“...We’re going to need to have GIS people. We’re going to need to have policy-makers, public works folks ...” Chuck Magaha, Levenworth County, Kansas’ director of emergency management on pulling together resources to help in recovery efforts in the south.
The Tonganoxie Mirror

Historical Note

“When did this calamity happen? It hasn’t—yet. But the doomsday scenario is not far-fetched. The Federal Emergency Management Agency lists a hurricane strike on New Orleans as one of the most dire threats to the nation, up there with a large earthquake in California or a terrorist attack on New York City. Even the Red Cross no longer opens hurricane shelters in the city, claiming the risk to its workers is too great.”
Gone with the Water
National Geographic (October 2004)

Search Usage

“Searches for satellite map images of before and after shots of the affected areas of Hurricane Katrina have also jumped more than 300 percent over the past week.”
Lycos Press Release