With our equipment problems, we scrambled to mark out an area for the Polish magnetometry team to start working in on Tuesday. Although there was a miscommunication about the desired size of squares, much was prepared by the time of their arrival on-site. They made quick work of it, finishing Cemetery C (with over a hectare of land being surveyed) by the end of Wednesday. We laid out Cemetery A on Wednesday, just in time for them to start it on Thursday.
The long-hoped-for cable arrived for the EDM. However, we quickly discovered that it did not solve our communications error issues. After troubleshooting over the phone to the States, we discovered that it is actually the port on the EDM itself (in addition to the original cable) that is bad. So, after a week and a half of waiting for what we thought would fix all of our problems, we are still stuck with manually crunching coordinates and zero-setting on a lamppost. We were quite disappointed that this was not figured out a week and a half earlier, when we might have had time to arrange renting or borrowing another machine, whereas now we’re so close to having to finish up at the site that it’s probably not worth trying. So, on with the number crunching!
6 comments:
Technology is such a PITA sometimes. What you all are doing is so fascinating to me. Thanks for the explanation on the pottery. The whole area where you are is so beautiful looking from the pictures your Mom shared.
I didn't realize math was such an integral part of your work. Cool.
Monica
I hate that the three of you have had such problems with the EDM equipment. :-( But I'm glad you can do the work, even though it's harder without the machine.
I am finding the process quite interesting. But I don't know exactly why are you doing what you're doing. What is the final goal?
Also, what contribution is the Polish team making to the final goal? I'm not sure why they're there.
Thanks.
P.S. Great pun in the title of your blog post. :-)
The goal is to have a very accurate map of the site, including pottery distribution (and, therefore, time periods and general usage of the site). Magnetometry is essentially underground radar, which shows dense items, such as mud brick tombs up to about 2 meters below the surface. It aids in finding where to excavate and also sometimes to see the form of structures without needing to excavate.
I forgot to mention: magnetometry is very expensive, so we are only using limited survey of that type, about 3 hectares.
Thanks for the explanation. Now I get it!
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