When Surveying Magic Happens

Offering their clients Superior Value is a cornerstone on which Storm Geomatics is built. The Survey Calendar is a very useful tool which was designed and shared with Storm’s clients during September. To assist survey procurement, Storm have designed the calendar to ensure all their clients are informed of the best time of year to undertake different types of surveys, maximising data capture efficiencies and therefore creating the best value. Download your copy here: Yearly Survey Planner

“When two expert survey companies collaborate, magic happens!” This was just so during September when the survey skills of Storm Geomatics and Severn Partnership combined. The project was to assist with the TransPennine Route Upgrade (TRU) which is a multi-billion pound, transformative, long-term railway infrastructure programme that will improve connectivity in the North between Manchester and York. Storm was asked to undertake a bathymetric survey around several viaducts in Dewsbury. This survey captured all data below the water level. Simultaneously Storm provided a boat and trained personnel to navigate the channel with Severn Partnerships and the Leica Pegasus 2 mobile mapping unit to capture the above water data. The two point clouds were combined to provide a full picture of the river bed, any scour and bridge condition. This was a hugely rewarding project for both teams and the data deliverables are currently being processed, so do watch this space for more insight into how the magic worked!

Towards the end of September Storm began an extensive survey project in Suffolk, a county which beautifully combines coastal, rural and wetland landscapes. The project will deliver essential channel survey updates which will be used to provide a better understanding of the fluvial flood risk, identifying communities and properties that may be at risk. In addition to this the data will be used to investigate different maintenance and/or management scenarios to alleviate flood risk. Important preparation work was carried out in advance of team mobilisation. This included identifying, informing, and discussing access with landowners, as well as some technical preparation which included survey control installation. These preparation tasks will ensure that teams of surveyors will be able to take full advantage of their time on site and focus on their data collection, improving project efficiency. This project is led by Senior Surveyor Tom Atkinson, to follow progress please look out for tweets from site.

Another promotion was celebrated in September with Saul Bolton becoming a Junior Surveyor, he is now embarking on his own projects whilst he works towards further promotion to surveyor in the near future. Many congratulations Saul!

Trainee surveyor Cailtin Tonge undertook an important secondment during September. We hear from Cailtin “In September I was incredibly fortunate to be asked to represent the Scouts at the Lying in State of Her Majesty the Queen. The Scouts have always had a special relationship with the queen and even attended her coronation, so it was a real privilege to be 1 of the 150 Scouts in the UK to be selected for this special state occasions.

For one week, I travelled into London at 5am each day from Scout HQ (Gilwell) near Waltham Abbey, to assist with the queues at Victoria Tower Gardens. These gardens are next to the Houses of Parliament and were the last area the public would walk through before reaching security at the Palace of Westminster. Our job was to provide support for security. This included pre-security checks, assisting with the accessibility queue, handing out blankets, food and water provisions, generally being a friendly face to the public and occasionally an interview or two! The feedback from the public was extremely positive as they expressed their gratitude and our team also managed to collect over 4 tonnes of food for a local Westminster food bank that would have otherwise been wasted.”

“The atmosphere in London that week was amazing. Even though there was an immense security presence, the public were all very relaxed and in good spirits by the time they reached us after 14 hours in the queue. I worked with some amazing people in the week, and it was lovely that on Monday we could all relax and watch the funeral together.”

Storm are very proud of Caitlin’s contribution in the running of this important national event.

All the wet and wild adventures from Storm can be viewed via our LinkedIn page @Storm Geomatics Limited and our other social media channels. Twitter @stormgeomatics Instagram @stormgeomatics1