Evening star., 1962-04-15
GEoDETc RE-cHARTNG BEGINS
U.S.. Surveys Nearby Storm-Hit Coast
By G. o. HERNDON
Star Staff Writer

AND GEODETIC SURVEY
SHIP PHOTOGRAPHER, April
14.-The officers and crew of
the photographer have hit Del
aware's barrier beaches and
launched a top-priority resur-
vey of this Storm-battered
coast.
Today, the ships technicians
and their theodoliteS, SextantS,
tide gauges and fathometers
were immobilized temporarily
as a 40-mile-an-hour breeze
swept the entrance to Delaware
Bay.
The vessel, a 164-foot, steel
hulled photographic ship, ar
rived here Thursday after COM
pleting a stormy, nine-day
voyage from Florida to join a
land-Sea-air task force assem-
bled to update coastal charts
in the wake Of the March 6
storm.
On Wednesday, the Hydro
grapher cast off from the Army
Terminal dock at Hampton
Roads, Norfolk, for the last run
to it's present anchorage a mile
outside Lewes, Del, inside the
Hen and Chicken Shoals and
the breakwater off Cape Hen
lopen.
Cape HenlOpen Chosen
Official orders last month
from the Coast and Geodetic
Survey, Department of Com
merce, spelled out the ships
mission, a phase of Special
Project 6-62. This will include
special photographic investiga-
tions at inlets, harbors and
shoals believed to have been af-
fected by the March storm that
struck the coastline from Long
Island to North Carolina.
A supplemental order dated
March 90 directed the Hydro
grapher to make a chart in
Spection" of the approaches and
entrance to Delaware Bay with
special emphasis on changes
brought about by storm dam
age off Cape Henlopen.
Comdr. Raymond M. Stone,
the skipper, said he had de-
tailed orders to re-chart Indian
River inlet, five miles north Of
Bethany Beach, Del, Ocean
City MD inlet and Diamond
Shoals off Cape Hatteras, N. C.
Other componentS Of the task
force include land-baSed tri-
angulation parties, the aerial
mappers of the Surveys Pho
togrammetry Division, and four
smaller survey vessels.
To Chart Wide Area
In surveys already under way,
the various units of the task
force will re-chart the coastal
waters of all the States hit by
the early March northeaster.
Although Force Seven winds
(32-to-38 miles per hour on the
Beaufort scale) immobilized
the photographers sounding
launches today, advance survey
teams reached Indian River in
let by truck over the sand
choked ocean road along the
barrier beach yesterday.
A control point team headed
by 1t. Comdr. Jack E. Guth
and Ensign Gerald Fussell and
a tidal gauge team directed by
1t. G.g.) Meinrade H. Schilly
began operations at the inlet.
Depth readings in the inlet
are to be adjusted to the tide
gauge readings, obtained from
a tidestaff installed in an
abandoned Coast Gaurd boat
basin just inside the damaged
inlet bridge.
Stylus Marks Level
The gauge installed by 1t.
Schilly's crew consists of the
tidestaff and a clock drum at
tached to an asphaltic pipe. AS
the tide rises and falls, its
minute-by-minute level is
scratched onto the drums wax
coated paper by a stylus.
To correlate the gauge with
precise geodetic levels the crew
installed nearby two bronze
Coast and Geodetic bench
marks.
On the dunes north Of the
inlet, Comdr. Guth's men To-
Gated the signals" by which
off-shore fathometer launches
would later fix their positions
while sounding.
The signals" employed are a
jetty light, transmission towers
beside the still impossible
bridge. a distant water tank
and temporary markers in
stalled by the surveyors along
the dune line.
Aerial Maps Made
Later, the control points will
be given precise positions on
c & G charts with data supplied
by aerial mapping teams.
Aerial photographers in the
Surveys photogrammetry divi-
sion have in recent weeks pub
liShed nine charities" showing
changes in the coastline at Cape
Lookout, Ocracoke Inlet, Oregon
Inlet and New River Inlet in
North Carolina; Ocean City,
Md; Cape Henlopen and the
Indian River inlet entrance in
Delaware; Chincoteague Inlet,
Va, and Absecon Inlet. NJ.
Aboard the photographer,
Shipboard personnel constantly
re-check the vessels elaborate
electronic gear-Loran naviga-
tional equipment, radarscopes
and a battery of fathometerS,
which measure the waters
depth in fathoms.
The ships two motor