footleg
New member
As people should already be aware, the weekend of 9-10th April 2011 is the annual Cave Technology Symposium (on the Sat.) in Hulland Ward in the Peak District. The Sunday is traditionally a Cave Surveying Group (CSG) field meeting. This year the intention was to offer training on paperless cave surveying using DistoX instruments with PocketTopo software on a PDA (the underground bit that was covered at last year's event in Yorkshire) and drawing up surveys using software on a computer after the trip.
Having found out about 10 minutes ago that I have been promoted from attendee to training person I thought it would be a good idea to first publicise this event here, and second to ask interested participants what they would be most interested in the training covering. At the recent weekend event run in the Mendips it took 1 day to cover the underground part of the process (half day being shown the kit and software indoors, followed by an afternoon trip to gather some data and get practical experience of the kit), followed by a second complete day learning the basics of the software for drawing up the surveys (using Therion). Since I attended that event I can muddle through the basics of Therion, plus I am more expert in Survex & Tunnel (the UK developed alternative software for drawing up cave surveys). So any of these areas could be covered, but with only a Sunday to do so we cannot cover them all!
So if you are interested in attending then please post here what you would like to learn. If it is only me training people then it will depend on participants bringing their own surveying equipment and laptops if we are going to do a computer training session. Numbers are limited to how many people can realistically gather round a computer monitor and still read the screen. Indoor venue is likely to be the BCRA Library for indoor training, but I plan to be staying at the Orpheus Hut Saturday night. So if the demand is for an underground session then we need to determine a suitable underground venue in that area where we can play. By which I mean 'please recommend a suitable location' as I am not that familiar with the area. In fact GPS location of the Orpheus Hut would be helpful if I am to find my way there in the first place!
Having found out about 10 minutes ago that I have been promoted from attendee to training person I thought it would be a good idea to first publicise this event here, and second to ask interested participants what they would be most interested in the training covering. At the recent weekend event run in the Mendips it took 1 day to cover the underground part of the process (half day being shown the kit and software indoors, followed by an afternoon trip to gather some data and get practical experience of the kit), followed by a second complete day learning the basics of the software for drawing up the surveys (using Therion). Since I attended that event I can muddle through the basics of Therion, plus I am more expert in Survex & Tunnel (the UK developed alternative software for drawing up cave surveys). So any of these areas could be covered, but with only a Sunday to do so we cannot cover them all!
So if you are interested in attending then please post here what you would like to learn. If it is only me training people then it will depend on participants bringing their own surveying equipment and laptops if we are going to do a computer training session. Numbers are limited to how many people can realistically gather round a computer monitor and still read the screen. Indoor venue is likely to be the BCRA Library for indoor training, but I plan to be staying at the Orpheus Hut Saturday night. So if the demand is for an underground session then we need to determine a suitable underground venue in that area where we can play. By which I mean 'please recommend a suitable location' as I am not that familiar with the area. In fact GPS location of the Orpheus Hut would be helpful if I am to find my way there in the first place!