As with previous months, my team has been frequenting the field often conducting a variety of inspections. I can say that our hard work has been paying off and we are ahead of schedule with the annual inspections. I have been working alongside the Forest Engineer, two Civil Engineers and a fellow RA to complete the inspections. Altogether, we have conducted 63 Facility Conditions surveys, with only four remaining for the year. We have completed six dam safety inspections with four remaining. Lastly, we completed the 100% of the annual random road surveys required. Moving forward, we will continue to conduct inspections on contracts and timber sale road surveys. All in all, we have been diligent with our field inspections, and it has paid off greatly.

Since the last time I wrote, I had a great opportunity to attend the ESRI User Conference in San Diego. I have been wanting to attend this conference for over 7 years now and finally was able to. I am extremely grateful for the chance to go, and I had a great time. I was able to network with other RAs from other Forests and Cohorts. I was also able to speak to a wide variety of GIS Professionals including several Forest Service employees and other DOI agencies. During the conference, I attended workshop that pertain to my life at the Modoc, focusing heavily on field data collection. I took notes with some ideas to implement into future Field Maps, Survey123, and Quick Capture projects. I believe it was a great experience and hopefully I get to attend again in the future. I recommend the conference for anyone that has an interest or career in GIS.

As my internship experience continues, I will be planning another trip with my supervisor to conduct trail bridge inspection in support of another forest. Additionally, I will be hiking into the wilderness to conduct the last of dam inspections for the year. I am looking forward to the upcoming experience. Life is never dull at the Modoc!