What
do Nord, Greenland; Isla Socorro, Mexico; Easter Island;
Heard Island in the Indian Ocean; and Mawson Station, Antarctica have
in common? They were all stations in the Earth-girdling satellite
triangulation program of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey
of the 1960's. If there ever was a project that carried a NOAA ancestor
agency to the far ends of the Earth, it was the satellite triangulation
program. "Have suitcase (and BC-4 Camera), will travel" became the
mode of life of a small group of employees of the Coast and Geodetic
Survey as they rode ships, aircraft, helicopters, and sometimes even
living modes of transportation to their destinations from north polar
region to south polar region with stops at many remote corners of
the Earth in between. Their mission was to measure the Earth, determine
exact distances and directions between points thousands of miles apart,
and help develop a better model for the shape of the Earth. This early
space-based geodetic system was a forerunner of today's Global Positioning
System. Join the Coast Surveyors as they traveled over our Earth in
quest of a better understanding of its size and shape for science
and engineering ....
