By Kathryn Morton

The Pine Log - Features Editor

GIS Students Help Map Debris Area

Stephen F. Austin State University’s HUES Geographic Information Systems Lab and the College of Forestry's Forest Resources Institute have been providing detailed maps of the debris area to emergency officials and NASA since about 20 minutes after the space shuttle exploded.

On Saturday, the lab was mapping Nacogdoches and parts of San Augustine County. Less than 24 hours later, it was providing maps for more than 27 counties, said Dr. Darrel McDonald, coordinator of the lab and an associate professor of political science and geography.

County Judge Sue Kennedy said at a press conference Sunday afternoon that Nacogdoches was fortunate to have use of SFA’s facilities.

“Other counties don’t have access to this resource,” she said. “We can provide (NASA and federal officials) with information in computerized form.”

McDonald said he started mobilizing SFA’s facility in the basement of the Ferguson Building around 8:20 a.m.

“The staff just came in on its own,” he said. “They knew what we have to have.”

About 45 alumni and present geography students have been collecting location data from dispatch numbers from the sheriff’s office, McDonald said. The data is transferred to a log, a copy of which is entered into a global positioning system program called Geographic Information Systems.

“We’re basically an archive,” he explained. “We’re a validation center.”

McDonald said those staff members working in the field check the validity of the debris. Occasionally, the sites turn out to be false alarms.

“Then we can take that site off the list,” he said. “But we don’t have many cases of misinformation.”

At a 1 p.m. press conference at the Nacogdoches County Jail on Sunday, Nacogdoches County Sheriff Thomas Kerss said the county had logged about 1,200 locations with debris. At the same time, the county was continuing to receive about 25 new locations out of approximately 150 calls an hour.

“There’s a debris field here that we’ll never be able to collect,” McDonald said.

It’s been keeping the students in the GIS lab busy.

“Two or three of them have been in there for more than 30 hours with no break,” McDonald said. One student working on Sunday afternoon said he had been working since events began Saturday morning — with the exception of a four-hour nap. Laried Stephen Oates III, Center senior, said the importance of his work hasn’t really sunk in yet.

“I don’t have time to think,” he said. “I’ve just been busy. It’s a lot of work, a lot of data.”

The dedication of Oates and others has made an impression on McDonald.

“It makes me want to cry a little bit,” McDonald said.

They’re tears of joy, though.

“This is a really unique opportunity,” he said.

Now, not only are those working in the lab getting practice for a future career, they are helping the community and country as well, McDonald said.

“We’ve been trying for 10 years to create a center to help people,” he said. “And we’re getting a chance to show that we have the talent and the technology to ramp up and get going quickly.”