About 30 students from CIEG498 (Hydrogeology) toured the DGS sample repository and were introduced to water level monitoring and drilling equipment on February 16, 2017. This is the fifth year that students of Dr. Paul Imhoff’s class got a firsthand view of a small part of DGS hydrogeology research operations. Dr. Imhoff finds “This tour has been very, very helpful for students in the past, since actually get to see and touch some field equipment related to groundwater systems.”

Senior Research Technician and licensed driller Steve McCreary explained how the drill rig and drilling tools work and are used in both DGS research and the outside engineering consulting world. Hydrogeologist Scott Andres described how the different types of samples collected by the drilling equipment are used for structural design, natural resource exploration, and environmental contamination studies. The Survey’s 300,000 plus sample repository was shown as an example of the importance of efficient and comprehensive management of sample data and sample metadata.

Hydrogeologist Tom McKenna displayed and demonstrated a variety of tools and instruments used to collect information on groundwater levels and explained how these data are critical to management of water resources and understanding of groundwater processes such as flow velocities and directions, contaminant transport, and response to changing climate conditions. Students were also introduced to the Survey's public data access pages for water level information.