Overview Field Activity Collections System (FACS) Log

Topic
Information

USGS Activity ID i.e. YYPRJ## *
03CCH01

Other ID (if any)
XSTORMS.h20030921i

Organization(s)/Program
U. S. Geological Survey, St. Petersburg Coastal and Marine Science Center

Project/Theme
Extreme Storm Coastal Change Hazards

Area of Operation
The Eastern coasts of Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina, and the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia.

Principal Investigator(s)
D. Krohn, K.L.M. Morgan, and P. Thompson of the USGS in St. Petersburg, Fla., and K. Miller of Bay Air Charters, Inc.

Information Specialist(s)
R. Peterson

Activity Type
Oblique Aerial Photo and Video Survey

Scientific Purpose/Goals
Post-Hurricane Isabel survey to document the storm impact on the coast.

Platform
Piper Navajo Chieftain, tail number N2KK

Starting Date
September 21, 2003

Starting Port/Location
Ocean City, Md.

Ending Date
September 23, 2003

Ending Port/Location
Redwood, Va.

Equipment Used
Two Nikon F3 cameras, Sony DCR-VX1000 Handycam Video Camera, Compix Video Titler, Trimble Centurion GPS, Rockwell Collins PLGR GPS

Information to be Derived (e.g., Grain Size, Depth to Basement)
Analysis of coastal change due to extreme storms

Summary of Activity and Data Gathered
8 mini DV tapes burned onto 4 DVDs; 106 rolls of film (approximately 3,003 slides)

Notes (include staff, shop time etc)
35 millimeters analog slides positives digitally scanned by J. Subino. 
Two separate records of flight navigation were collected during the survey. The first was a continuous ASCII text file from the PLGR that recorded only latitudes and longitudes for the entire flight at 30-sec intervals. No time values were recorded by the PLGR. The second navigation record came from the Trimble Centurion GPS. It recorded subtitles onto the video, which were taken continuously throughout the survey. The video subtitles recorded latitude, longitude, and time in hours, minutes, and seconds using a Compix Titler unit. Latitude, longitude, and time was manually extracted from the video every 5 minutes, and these values were matched to the latitude and longitude in the PLGR GPS file. Time was interpolated between these 5-min fixes using Excel to produce a 1-sec time value record for the entire flight. 
The Nikon MF-14 camera data back imprints each photograph as it is taken on the lower right corner of the slide film: the time in day, hour, and minute format (seconds are not recorded). These values were read and entered from the photographs into an Excel spreadsheet. It is assumed that the photographs were taken at a constant rate during any given minute of flight and seconds assigned to each photograph, accordingly. For example, if 15 photographs were taken during minute 19:00, we assume that a picture was taken every 4 sec. The photographs were assigned the time values 19:00:00, 19:00:04, 19:00:08, and so on. The time values were then cross-referenced to the interpreted latitude and longitude values discussed above to assign approximate positions to each photograph. As a result, it should be noted that the latitude, longitude, and time assigned to each photograph is an estimate of the aircraft/camera position. 
Analog and digital data are stored at the USGS St. Petersburg office in the Extreme Storm Impact Event storage facility, Room A142 and B267.