Dewberry, a privately held professional services firm, has announced that it has been awarded a task order for the Gravity for the Redefinition of the American Vertical Datum (GRAV-D) project, which falls under the firm’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shoreline mapping contract, awarded in 2020.
The GRAV-D project is part of NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey (NGS). Dewberry is providing aircraft services for gravity data collection. The predominately airborne campaign will contribute to the development of a new national vertical datum, North American-Pacific Geopotential Datum of 2022 (NAPGD2022), which will provide improved height information to the country. Having accurate height data is critical information necessary to better mitigate the threats to low-lying communities and coastal ecosystems from inundation by storms, flooding, tsunamis, and/or sea level rise. Additionally, this information supports the civilian surveying community.
“The goal of NOAA’s NGS is to help define the new spatial reference system,” says Dewberry Senior Associate Elise MacPherson, PMP. “Our team is excited to work alongside NOAA for the acquisition of these data as a part of the NGS goal to define the new spatial reference systems.”