The forces of nature are familiar enough to us field surveyors, but only when they occur in the extreme do they come to the attention of the news media and bring home to everyone the vulnerability of our society. Such occasions were the December ’04 Tsunami, hurricane Katrina in the US, and scores of typhoons, like Tokage and Khanun, bringing disaster to Eastern China, Korea and Japan.
Particularly when these phenomena hit infrastructure like ports, waterways and dikes, our surveying industry is faced with ad hoc priority work. Work which includes surveying to investigate the damage, the hazards to safe navigation, to see if ports can be used safely again and surveying to support plans and subsequent repair work. Mobile hydrographic units can be an answer to this peak-capacity demand. I understand that four mobile teams (Navigation Response Teams) were directed to wait outside the predicted path of Katrina to be prepared to carry out survey work in the immediate aftermath.
The reality of Hurricane Katrina made clear, however, that there would be a longer-lasting demand for hydrographic surveying capacity than just immediate response. The hurricane delivered a loud wake-up call to politicians worldwide: what can happen in a rich and modern society like the US can happen anywhere. Risk analyses will now be under urgent review, as will plans for reinforcement of embankments and other measures with the same precautionary goal. It may be found that where such plans exist they have been shelved due to budget constraints or phased according to low-key prioritisation. Politicians are more inclined to support plans for something more tangible, something in everyday use - a new bridge, a motorway, or a sports complex - than plans for strengthening a dike or other precautionary measures. After all, these might be necessary only when an extreme event occurs; and that, say their risk assessors, is perhaps once in every hundred years… and surely not during their period in office! It would be wise for our industry to nurture and keep vividly alive the present revived awareness and urge to take measures, both out of professional responsibility for society and concern for our own jobs and company profits.

Survey-data processing in the pre-digital era was done as soon and as close to data collection as possible; one of the reasons being to prevent discovering missing data or uncertainties when the ship had already left the survey area. The early days of automation, including among other things the price of computer hardware, forced a ‘splits’ in the working procedure. It meant automated logging onboard and processing ashore and, in some cases, sending the processed data back to the ship for verifying and signing so as to place responsibility back with the field surveyor. This split working procedure decreased job satisfaction and motivation. The computing power of affordable presentday machines makes possible almost real-time processing of an enormous volume of data, thanks to new equipment like MBES which can generate 1Gb/hr. The day will come when present operational projects where pilots within a few hours of survey completion have the chart information in their PPU (Personal Pilot Unit) automatically updated, plus online access to actual tides and currents, will also be available for ships’ captains on general shipping. The latter are presently performing their own version of the splits: the pilot having access to all detailed online information on his ‘machine’, whilst final responsibility lies with the captain, who lacks the same.