New lake mapping technologies evaluated on Goey Pond , Hartwick , NY Paul

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a U.S. military system made possible by 24 satellites in precise orbits circling the earth's surface twice daily (Garmin Corporation@, 1998; Connolly, 1998). GPS technology has been in widespread use in the civilian sector for most of the last decade. Nevertheless, it is not often considered for lake mapping because it is not as precise as traditional survey methods. This lack of precision is primarily due to the fact that the civilian variant of the system has a "j itter" of approximately 75 meters intentionally introduced into it to prevent hostile forces from using the GPS against the interests of the United States government (Dana, 1998). Nevertheless, the author believed that the 75-meter jitter (and inherent system inaccuracy of 20+ meters) might be insignificant in mapping any but the smallest lake if civilian system averaging functions were employed. This study reviews the practicality of using commercial GPSs and an in-house C++ program to map a small lake, Goey Pond (latitude: 42° 37.52'; longitude: 074° 58.46' ), in Otsego County, New York.