#BLMoregon

[skylupine]

blmoregon

[mypubliclands]

BLM employees stretch their wings as UAS/drone operators

Throughout the cloudy June afternoon, BLM radios crackled to life with Oregon voices in Montana’s Bozeman Valley, just as they do on incidents such as wildland fires, where air resources play a critical role and their safe management is one of the BLM’s highest priorities.

There was no actual Harper Fire, though. It was just one part of a series of elaborate hands-on exercises for a national team of advanced BLM remote pilots flying Unmanned Aircraft Systems—known colloquially as drones.

During the first two weeks of June, five BLM Oregon/Washington employees participated alongside employees from other federal bureaus and states in two Department of the Interior/Bureau of Land Management UAS drone training courses in Bozeman, Montana, put on by the National UAS Program.

Tavis Fenske (an engine captain from Prineville District), Matthew Noss (a supervisory range technician from Prineville District), Jesse Morris (a supervisory range technician [fire] from Lakeview District), and Greg Shine (a public affairs specialist from the State Office) all completed the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Basic Remote Pilot Training (A-450) course and the Advanced UAS Workshop over the two-week period. Jason Horstman from Vale District also served as one of the instructors and cadre members for the A-450 course.

“I was really excited at the opportunity to learn more about UAS operations and how it may make the job that we do every day safer and more efficient,” said Morris. “This class and workshop have really been an eye opener for me regarding all the uses for UAS within natural resource work.  I look forward to bringing these tools and knowledge back to my district and putting it to work in a variety of areas this season.”

In the basic A-450 course, students learned about UAS policy and how to file a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM), how to safely fly the 3DR Solo aircraft, and how to capture images and videos with the GoPro payload. After successfully passing a written final exam and an individual evaluation flight administered by an authorized DOI Office of Aircraft Services inspector, Fenske, Noss, Morris and Shine moved on to the advanced workshop the following week.

Through the advanced workshop—with its focus on UAS for fire operations and complex photography, videography, mapping, and resource projects—the students developed the skills required to capture and pre-process (geotag) data and coordinate with incident personnel and aircraft.

Workshop highlights included resource mapping projects integrating gathered data into PhotoScan software and Gaia and Avenza maps—plus the fire incident scenario, complete with real-time radio traffic and its inherent communications complexities.

“In fire, I think the UAS program will become a new tool that will allow us to gain situational awareness quickly and efficiently, said Noss. “The biggest takeaway I have from the class is that the program is in its infancy and as technology advances, who knows what can become of it.”

Noss's observation seems prescient, as the BLM is poised to continue its leading role in the vanguard of federal UAS programs. This is an additional appeal to the and the newly-minted remote pilots who join the growing ranks of certified staff in Oregon/Washington and nationwide.

"I think it is pretty cool that the BLM is the nation's leading agency in the use of drone technology, " said Fenske, "and I'm excited to be a part of such a forward-thinking program. I'm really looking forward to applying—and developing—my new skills in the field."

[photographypins]

"Wallowa River": The photo was taken by "BLMOregon" on Flickr & Uploaded to Flickr dated on May 04, 2017 at 01:12AM & shared under CC attribution license.

[jlsonfire]

The most important thing human beings need to do about wild horses is to ensure that they remain wild horses! ~ Mehmet Murat İldan ~ For tomorrow & in the upcoming week, I beg of you @blmoregon Please treat our beloved #southsteensmustangs with care & respect, as you take them from the home & families, that they've only known & loved, since they were born, there in the Steens Mountain. Especially with the huge forest fires & heat that is taking over Oregon...They, those beautiful Wildies, own a huge piece of my heart, & I only want them to be treated as the amazing beings that they are...thank you for reading💜🐎💫 (at Steens Mountain Wilderness) https://www.instagram.com/p/CiT4NwILhKv/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[fishing-exposed]

@BLMOregon: Happy #NationalVolunteerMonth! 🙋💕 Volunteer interpretive hosts Donna and Roger have helped thousands of visitors at Yaquina Head. They even used their fly fishing expertise to install non-slip spikes on staff tidepooling boots! Learn more: https://t.co/i2oX77h710 BLM 📸 https://t.co/gADpj3lWbT

[seekinggreenerpastures]

4 Ways to Avoid a Mental Health Crisis During Difficult Times

4 Ways to Avoid a Mental Health Crisis During Difficult Times #mentalhealthcrisis #mentalhealth #oregonwildfires

Oregon wildfire photo courtesy of @BLMOregon (Bureau of Land Management)

Twenty-seven wildfires are burning across Oregon. The fires have resulted in in entire communities’ evacuations, the loss of homes and businesses for hundreds of families, and potential for mental health crisis.

Across the state, Oregonians are struggling with hazardous air quality, making breathing difficult. This…

[dakineoregon]

Some of today's visitors to the Oregon coast. They're about as long as a big school bus, weigh about 80,000 pounds and we love them: California Grey Whales.

[forestmood]

Explore Oregon Recreation: Whittaker Creek Recreation Site by BLMOregon

[injectionmoldchina]

New Post has been published on http://www.injectionmouldchina.com/cool-plastic-molded-part-images/

Cool Plastic Molded Part images

A few nice plastic molded part images I found:

Printing the past: 3-D archaeology and the first Americans

Image by BLMOregon Photos were captured at the Pacific Slope Archaeological Laboratory on the Oregon State University Campus in Corvallis, Dec. 13, 2016, to accompany the feature story below: "Printing the past: 3-D archaeology and the first Americans." Article online here (and below): goo.gl/viKEZF

Photo by Matt Christenson, BLM Story by Toshio Suzuki, BLM

—————————————-

For the first Americans, and the study of them today, it all starts with a point.

A sharp point fastened to a wooden shaft gave the hunter 13,000 years ago a weapon that could single-handedly spear a fish or work in numbers to take down a mammoth.

For a prehistoric human, these points were the difference between life and death. They were hunger-driven, handmade labors of love that took hours to craft using a cacophony of rock-on-rock cracks, thuds and shatters.

They have been called the first American invention, and some archaeologists now think 3-D scanning points can reveal more information about both the technology and the people.

The Pacific Slope Archaeological Laboratory at Oregon State University takes up only a few rooms on the ground floor of Waldo Hall, one of the supposedly haunted buildings on campus.

There are boxes of cultural history everywhere, and floor-to-ceiling wood cabinets with skinny pull-out drawers housing even more assets, but the really good stuff, evidence of the earliest known cultures in North America, lives in an 800-pound gun safe.

Loren Davis, anthropology professor at OSU and director of the lab, thinks 3-D scanning, printing, and publishing can circumvent the old traditions of the field, that artifacts are only to be experienced in museums and only handled by those who have a Ph.D.

“We are reimagining the idea of doing archaeology in a 21st century digital way,” said Davis. “We don’t do it just to make pretty pictures or print in plastic, we mostly want to capture and share it for analysis,” he added.

Nearby in the L-shaped lab, one of his doctoral students is preparing to scan a point that was discovered on Bureau of Land Management public lands in southeast Oregon.

Thousands of points have been unearthed since the 1930s in North America, the first being in eastern New Mexico near a town called Clovis. That name is now known worldwide as representing the continent’s first native people.

More recently, though, other peoples with distinctive points were found elsewhere, and some researchers think it means there was differing technology being made at the same time, if not pre-Clovis.

One such location is the Paisley Caves in southern Oregon ― one of the many archaeologically significant sites managed by the BLM.

The earliest stem point from Paisley Caves was scanned at Davis’ lab and a 3-D PDF was included in a 2012 multi-authored report in the journal Science.

Davis estimates his lab at OSU has scanned as many as 400 points, including others from BLM-managed lands in Idaho, Nevada, Oregon and Washington.

More scans would mean a bigger database for comparing points and determining what style they are.

“Ideally, we want to get as many artifacts scanned as possible,“ said Davis. “The BLM offers a lot of access to public data ― this is just another way of doing it.”

—

Transforming a brittle piece of volcanic glass, by hand, into a beautiful and deadly 4-inch-long spear point is a process.

In one hand would be a hard shaping rock, or maybe a thick section of antler, and in the other would be the starter stone, which in addition to igneous could be jasper, chert, or any other chippable rock that creates a hide-puncturing level of sharpness.

After what might be hundreds of controlled strokes and rock rotations, the rough shape of a lance or spear tip would take form. Discarded shards of stone would often result in more points, or other useful tools like scrapers and needles.

Clovis points are distinguished by their length, bifacial leaf shape and middle channels on the bottom called flutes. Eventually the repetitive flaking of the point would stop, and the hunter would use precise pressure points to create the flute on one or each side that likely helped slot the finished product into a spear-like wooden pole.

The hunter was now mobile and ready to roam.

—

Prior to 3-D scanning, OSU doctoral student Sean Carroll picks up a can of Tinactin, gives it the obligatory shake, and completely covers “one of the oldest technologies in North America” with antifungal spray.

The talc and alcohol from the athlete’s foot remedy helps the software see even the slightest indents in the point, and it rubs right off afterwards.

“I want to scan all the Clovis I can get my hands on,” said Carroll, who came to OSU because of Davis’ 3-D lab and is using the medium as a big part of his dissertation.

Two random items, a power plug adapter and a ball of clay, are placed on each side of the fluted point to give the camera and light projector perspective. The objects create margins that force the structured light patterns to bend and capture more of the point’s surface detail.

Even so, like the hunter rotating the shaping rock, the archaeologist has to rotate the foam square holding the three items. Each scan takes about six seconds.

Carroll and Davis estimate that the learning curve for this process was about 100 hours. One hundred hours of trial and error — and a lot of watching YouTube videos — for a finished product that they think is indisputably worth it.

A completed 3-D scan of a point will have about 40,000 data points per square inch. The measurements are so precise, they can determine the difference between flake marks as thin as a piece of paper.

Davis says no archaeologist with a pair of calipers can come close to measuring the data obtained via 3-D, because simply, “there are some jobs that robots are really good at.”

“If the end game is measurements, well you could spend your whole life with a pair of calipers trying to achieve what we can do in 10 minutes,” said Davis.

—

Last year, the famous human relative nicknamed Lucy had 3-D scans of her 3.2 million year old bones published in the journal Nature.

In 2015, archaeologists from Harvard University completed a 3-D scan of a winged and human-headed stone bull from Mesopotamia that stands 13 feet high at the Louvre Museum.

And the Smithsonian Institution is currently beta testing a website dedicated to publishing 3-D models from its massive collection, including molds of President Abraham Lincoln’s face and the entire Apollo 11 command module.

All of these new-school efforts are based upon the old-school scientific principles of preservation and promotion.

Rock points, fossils, hieroglyphics — various forms of cultural assets are susceptible to environmental conditions and not guaranteed to be around forever. Three-dimensional scanning is the most accurate way to digitally preserve these items of merit.

Once accurate preservation is done, there are opportunities for promoting not just science, but specific research goals.

In the case of the Lucy bones, scientists hope that crowdsourcing the 3-D data will help get more experts to look at the fossils and prove that the tree-dwelling ape died from a fall.

When it comes to comparing one specific stemmed point to an entire hard drive of scanning data, BLM archaeologist Scott Thomas thinks the work being done at the OSU lab can move archaeology to a new level.

“The 3-D scanning method blows anything we have done out of the water,” said Thomas.

That ability to compare points can lead to insights on how these hunting tools moved over geography, and even expand theories about how native groups learned new technologies.

“It’s going to be a really powerful tool someday — not too far off,” said Thomas.

While long-term data analysis may not be the sexiest form of archaeology, holding a 3-D printed stem point is a pretty cool educational tool.

Davis of OSU has incorporated 3-D prints into his classes and said his students are able to make a tactile connection with artifacts that otherwise are not available.

“The students really enjoy these printed and digital models and often say that they are almost like the real thing,” said Davis.

—

This spring, Davis is traveling to Magadan, Russia — aka Siberia — to inspect and scan some points that may be linked to Clovis peoples.

The goal in Siberia, of course, is to further expand the 3-D database. He is specifically interested in comparing them to stems from a BLM-managed site he excavated in Idaho called Cooper’s Ferry.

As his student, Carroll, begins to clean up and put the scanned points into their individually labeled ziplocked bags, Davis can’t help but mention how much easier international research could be with 3-D scanning.

“You can share cultural resource info with people in other countries and you don’t have to come visit,” he said, adding that Russia isn’t the easiest country to enter.

“It’s as easy as sending an email,” Carroll agreed.

Davis then mentioned his 11-year-old child and how much of school curriculum these days is web-based as opposed to text-based.

“There’s nothing wrong with books, I’m a huge fan of books, but it’s a different way of learning,” said the archaeology professor.

And with that, he made another point.

— by Toshio Suzuki, tsuzuki@blm.gov, @toshjohn

Best places to find 3-D archaeology online: — Sketchfab.com is one of the biggest databases on the web for 3-D models of cultural assets. Institutions and academics alike are moving priceless treasures to the digital space for all to inspect. Two examples: via the British Museum, a 7.25-ton statue of Ramesses II is available for viewing and free download; and via archaeologist Robert Selden Jr., hundreds of 3-D models are open to the public for study, including several Clovis points from the Blackwater Draw National Historic Site in New Mexico. — The Smithsonian Institution is bringing the best of American history to a new audience via their 3-D website (3d.si.edu). Amelia Earhart’s flight suit? Check. Native American ceremonial killer whale hat? Check. Face cast of President Abraham Lincoln? Check and check — there are two. And their biggest 3-D scan is still coming: the 184-foot-long space shuttle Discovery. — Visitors to Africanfossils.org can filter 3-D model searches by hominids, animals and tools, and also by date, from zero to 25 million years ago. The sleek website, with partners like National Geographic and the National Museums of Kenya, makes it easy to download or share 3-D scans, and each item even comes with a discovery backstory and Google map pinpointing exactly where it was found.

[deltacubed]

A single-engine air tanker makes a retardant drop on the Chucker Gulch Fire in eastern Oregon, July 22, 2019. BLM video: Nathen Navarro

That lightning-started grass wildfire was spotted Monday morning at 11 a.m., and crews had it controlled by 6 p.m.

[sproutfavorites]

#EarthDay volunteers removed 200 tires from eastern Oregon public land near Succor Creek on Saturday! #trashtag 🌎🙏💚 pic.twitter.com/R1EQ5xcRdq

— BLM Oregon & Washington (@BLMOregon) April 22, 2019

[mypubliclands]

Students use art to celebrate the Crooked Wild and Scenic River

For the past five years, the High Desert Museum in Bend, Oregon has partnered with local elementary schools to produce the Kids Curate artist program. Kids Curate ensures that arts education remains in schools and helps teachers deliver integrated arts projects to their students. Fully funded by grants and supported by various artists in residence, the program allows kids to tackle art projects based on everything from science to music. This year, the fifth graders at Crooked River Elementary School in Prineville, Oregon were selected for the intensive, six-month long arts education program – with the theme of celebrating the history, culture and wildlife of the Crooked Wild and Scenic River.

To truly tell the story of the river, the artists needed a little help – so they brought in some experts from the BLM Prineville District. Using the information provided by the BLM and the Museum staff, each of the kids designed and drew or painted their piece of the river – from the big picture of the river's ecosystem and rich geologic history, to the wildlife and the cultural history of the area. With the artists' instruction, the kids were also able to create large charcoal drawings representing different landscape views of the river.

As with any special exhibit, the program culminated with an opening night for the young artists. Kids and their friends and family joined the BLM and High Desert Museum for a celebration of their accomplishments. Buses brought in kids without rides so everyone could enjoy the night, and the Museum café offered a banquet dinner for everyone. The kids' art will remain on display for all Museum visitors to enjoy over the next month.

For the Prineville District, the partnership was a positive experience. Staff enjoyed teaching about their subjects and seeing the end result of the art and the kids' pride in their artwork on the opening night. Best of all, the BLM Prineville District will receive four interpretive panels that use the kids' art to tell the story of the Crooked Wild and Scenic River. These panels will be installed this fall along the Chimney Rock segment of the river, south of Prineville, where the kids and future visitors will be able to enjoy them for years to come.

Story by Lisa Clark, Public Affairs Officer. Photos by Lisa Clark; Kirstin Heins, Assistant Field Manager; and Bob Wick, BLM.

[photographypins]

"Wallowa River": The photo was taken by "BLMOregon" on Flickr & Uploaded to Flickr dated on May 04, 2017 at 01:12AM & shared under CC attribution license.

[jlsonfire]

Give me one moment in time When I'm more than thought I could be When all of my dreams are a heartbeat away And the answers are all up to me Give me one moment in time When I'm racing with destiny Then in that one moment of time I will be I will be I will be free ♡whitney houston Please Be Their Voice For Freedom❣️ We're all they have, for a better solution! Keep Them Safe! @blmoregon Steens Roundup is looming large this month💔 (at Steens Mountain Wilderness) https://www.instagram.com/p/ChNe5khvt2L/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[fishing-exposed]

@BLMOregon: Fall can be the best time of the year for trout fishing! Video: Owyhee River in eastern Oregon last month https://t.co/ehsEfRYPTc https://t.co/QSazSFYzgu

[desert-stories]

With no potable water, restroom facilities, cell phone service, or designated camping areas, travelers to the the Alvord Desert should bring their own conveniences and plan on a desolate, open-air adventure. 

(source:  Bureau of Land Management Oregon and Washington)