Kevin Gleeson

Kevin has a special interest in Photogrammetry and Mapping. However this has not stopped him getting involved in the other disciplines.

Palm Island 1 (Jumeriah, Dubai) Bathymetric survey - March 2004.

Final stage bathymetric survey of the entire Palm Island using a Reson 8101 Multibeam Echo sounder. Besides being involved in all aspects of the field work, he prepared all the charts (MicroStation V8) and supervised the reporting.

Baniyas Island Power cable route survey - February 2004.

Cable route survey using INOMAR Sediment Echo sounder. Reson 8101 Multibeam Echo sounder. Side scan sonar and magnetometer survey. The survey included staking out of the route on land and Topographic survey using a Sokkia RTK GPS. Besides being involved in all aspects of the field work, he prepared all the charts and supervised the reporting.
Qatar, Doha Port - December 2003. Conduct a post dredge bathymetric survey of Quay 4, 9 and 10. Equipment used: Reson 215 Single Beam Echo sounder. Delnorte DGPS.

Djibouti Sub bottom profile survey - November 2003.

Conducted a Sub-bottom profile survey of proposed Quay site.

Al Dabiya oil field - October 2003.

Manage and set out site control. Set out proposed pipeline route. Conduct a bathymetric survey of corridor where proposed route passes through channel. Field check survey data. Set out of geo-technical boreholes. Magnetometer and sub-bottom profile survey of corridor.

Jebel Ali power plant - July-August 2003.

Reson 8125 Multibeam Survey of proposed breakwater site. Set out geo-technical boreholes. Side scan sonar of site. Topographic survey of site. Liaison with client.

Umm Qasr channel Iraq - June 12-27 2003.

Reson 8125 Multibeam pre-dredge survey of 80 km x 500m channel. He was the only surveyor on board during this survey with work shifts of up to 20 hours per day. The survey included the survey of wrecks in (and close to) the proposed channel. He did all the post processing up to and including final chart production. The job was completed in record time again often working 20-hour shifts. His work was highly commended by the US Navy, USAID and Bechtel. The job was regarded as high priority as Umm Qasr port, strategic to the US Iraq rebuilding programme, could only function fully after the dredging of the channel. The job was carried out in hostile conditions, unmarked wrecks and unexploded ordinance littered the channel.

Dubai creek

Reson 8125 Multibeam Survey of area along quay wall. He supervised the mobilisation and liaised with the client (AST). He also conducted the survey and down loaded and backed up the acquired data and processed the tidal data and produced charts using MicroStation and uSMART.

Bathy Survey offshore Palm Island and Jebel Ali industrial area

Reson 8125 Multibeam. 3 000 line Km's of high-resolution bathymetric survey data. Including capture of pipes and seabed obstacles such as containers, concrete blocks etc. Data capture includes "psuedo" side scan sonar and sub-bottom profiling using a pinger. He supervised the mobilisation and liaised with the client "Palm Island Developers" (Nakheel). He personally conducted the survey which continued on a 24 hour, 7 days a week basis; this meant shift work was necessary. He trained 4 relief surveyors and stayed on board throughout the survey operation and personally processed tidal data and produced charts with thematic colouring of soundings and 0.5m contour intervals. He also produced animated fly through's of specific areas of interest using MicroStation V8.

Jebel Ali Port - Client Dubai Ports authority

Conducted a quay wall survey of container berth No.17 using a Reson SEABAT 8125 high-resolution multibeam echo sounder to determine the extent of sediment deposits. A GPS base station differential repeater was set up on Port control tower to kerb the effects of multipathing near gantry cranes and containers.

Palm Island crescent (breakwater) - Client Nakheel

Survey to produce model and extract cross-sections of the "wet" section of the breakwater. This survey was extended with a tacheometric survey of the "dry" section of the breakwater, thus enabling a complete model of the breakwater to be produced. His MicroStation modelling skills were called on to do the modelling and conduct the survey of the wall using a 35º degree tilted multibeam echo sounder.

Palm Island frond bathy survey - Client Nakheel

Survey in between the fronds, to produce an engineering model. This was a single beam survey. Standard bar checking and sound velocity profiles were conducted. He did not personally carry out these single beam surveys, but as Chief surveyor and was responsible for the smooth execution of the surveys by junior survey staff. Port Rashid harbour extension survey - Bathy survey to find wrecks and other obstacles outside Port Rashid.

South African Navy Hydrographic Survey Office Software project

The aim of this project was to convince the Hydrographic Survey office to purchase uSMART mapping software to assist their (then current) charting and modeling process. He used 2 million sounding points (ASCII x,y,z format) to produce a model of the seabed and applied a colour thematic and vertical exaggeration to the soundings using MicroStation and newly developed uSMART routines. His work was to test the routines for correct functioning under extreme circumstances. He then produced .avi fly through's and presented the results to an audience of more than 50 people, the presentation included a broad spectrum of survey related subject matter including an explanation on various map projections. Further conditions of sale included the developing of numerous Geodetic to Map transformation routines including a Bessel's transformation and was involved in the implementation of these routines. The software was purchased and is currently used by the SA Navy Hydrographic office.

South African National Road Agency Bridge structure survey

The aim of this project was to convince the National road agency that accurate bridge monitoring could be achieved using digital terrestrial photogrammetry rather than the expensive post processing intensive laser solution. He established control points at a local flyover using a Sokkia EZS 20 theodolite. The site was then photographed using a 4.5 mega pixel camera. The images where then setup in the uSMART Softcopy system and the automatic pixel correlation routine used to produce a high resolution DTM of structures on the bridge. A TIN was created of the bridge surfaces and each pixel from the digital images were projected into its correct geo-coordinated position based on the surface position, the camera principal point and the 3 camera rotations viz. omega, phi and kappa. A contractor to the agency purchased the system.

Real time Tacheometric plan production project

This project involved the interfacing of a Trimble GPS receiver to MicroStation via a laptop serial port. The GGA and NMEA strings are interrogated by uSMART software and the resulting coordinates are fed directly into MicroStation thus enabling real-time digital map production. A practical example of this is to attach a GPS antenna to a vehicle and drive down a road. The road center will be drawn as a MicroStation DGN vector in real time. These vectors can easily be exported to DWG or DXF format. He spent 2 weeks testing the project in a field environment. This routine is now used by various organizations in South Africa in various applications, the most noticeable of which is the real-time field checking of photogrammetric mapping.

De Beers open cast diamond mine mapping project

He was involved in a "ground breaking project" (pun intended). Open cast mining operations require surveyors to measure ore volumes and ore reserves. The mining face is not accessible (very steep and very high) and this makes it near impossible to measure. Another important criteria of accurate measurements on the mining face are to establish any movement on the face as this could lead to a rock fall and fatal consequences. His job was to show the client how accurate measurements of the entire mine could be achieved. This involved research into suitable digital cameras, establishing of control points, and the measurement of DTM's along the face using pixel correlation. He used the newly developed routines to roll out the entire (360º) mining surface and created 24-bit Orthophotos and a modeled surface.

Orthophoto production of Johannesburg Southgate Mall and environs project

The purpose of the project was to produce a 24-bit colour Orthophoto masterpiece complete with contours, spot heights and other enhancing data for display at the Conference of Southern African Surveyors CONSAS, held in Cape Town in March 2001. He produced the entire Orthophoto entirely on his own. The 3m x 2m Orthophoto was the focus of attention to many international surveyors.

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