Spring

Spring is always an exciting time for many hydrographers. Not just because it is the start of the good season for surveying (at least in the northern hemisphere where everybody is longing for warmer weather after a long, long winter...), but also because the season of the tradeshows and conferences will be starting.

Traditionally, spring has been a time for business-to-business (like the autumn) with new and known techniques being demonstrated to users at shows all over the world. One of the shows that has quickly become a regular fixture on the annual calendar is Ocean Business in Southampton, UK, that will take place from 9 to 11 April in 2013. Demonstrations and workshops play a prominent role at Ocean Business and the conference Offshore Survey taking place alongside the exhibition. In other words, it’s all about the products. The Hydro International team will of course be attending Ocean Business.

It’s going to be an exciting spring for Hydro International because we are introducing Geo-matching.com (www.geo-matching.com) for hydrography.

Geo-matching.com enables hydrographers to compare products before buying them. The website features detailed spec-based comparisons of more than 500 products and aims to lead you through the maze of specifications and gives you the opportunity to read reviews written by peers. Of course everybody is warmly invited to leave a balanced review of a product! The website brings together all the highly valued Hydro International product surveys, including GNSS receivers, Inertial Navigation Systems, Autonomous Underwater Vehicles, Remotely Operated Vehicles, Side-scan sonar, and Multi-beam echo sounders.

In addition to an extensive preview on the new products to be explored at Ocean Business, this issue of Hydro International carries an interesting interview with the director of the Norwegian Hydrographic Service (see page 10). Dutchman Evert Flier has been heading the NHS since 2010 and he pairs challenges of a modern hydrographic service to vision in how to adjust his organisation to these times. This adjusting requires balancing between the different roles of hydrography. On the one hand, of course, the traditional role of servicing the maritime world with accurate charts in order for them to be able to navigate safely. On the other side of the spectrum, the new role of hydrography servicing the blue economy in its broadest sense: oil & gas, fisheries and infrastructure in the coastal zone. A big help is the new standard S-100, according to Flier. The new standard will make it easier to provide data for other purposes. It makes it easy to put other data layers on top of hydrographic data and in doing so S-100 improves opportunities to integrate information, making bathymetric data more widely available and applicable. Indeed, exciting times in which the foundations upon which hydrography will develop further might be built.

Hopefully we’ll have the opportunity to meet each other in Southampton. If you are not able to come to the UK, we’ll keep you up to date with the daily e-mail newsletter from the show and conference floor. Hydro International wants to make sure you don’t miss a thing this spring!