In the lagoon at FoCO’s City Park:
A rather large RC boat
Powered by Nickel metal hydride batteries, this little boat was being tested by the U.S. Geological Survey for use in determining water depth in Colorado rivers. It’s about 5 feet in length and maybe 3 feet wide. At the top of the mast is a 360 degree prism target for a theodolite tracking measurement system.
Launching the toy boat
What kind of job lets you play in the water with a remote control boat? In the above picture, the nice young lady from the USGS is launching the boat by the edge of the lagoon. In this picture, the mast on the boat has been changed over to a GPS satellite dome antenna.
The USGS lady with the 360 degree prism
She was out on this nice day to make sure the equipment was working properly before traveling out near Grand Junction to do some work of some geological nature. Remember Grand Junction? It’s near Otto’s Monument.
The “Total Station”
Not just a Total Station mind you, but one of those newfangled ROBOTIC Total Stations that can be remotely activated to track the remotely activated toy boat as it goes down the river.