We’ve touched on a multitude of ways GPS is used here at Rocky Mountain Tracking. From fleet tracking to criminal tracking, wildlife tracking to tracking your beloved pet, GPS technology is used in dozens of different ways. Did you know that six College of the North Atlantic graduates are currently using GPS technology in an entirely different way than we’ve ever reported on before? They are working towards digitally mapping a Stephenville, Newfoundland, Canada graveyard.

 

The group of students has been wandering around the graveyard and recording each tombstone’s associated information: who is buried there, other family members that are also buried there, and dates of the family members’ birth and death. The information gathered is then associated to a specific GPS coordinate.

 

Instructor in Geographic Information Systems at the College of the North Atlantic, Dan Brooks, says this is a more efficient way to store the information. What used to be stored in reams upon reams of paper is now stored electronically. “So now it’s gone from paper now to (GPS) point,” said Brooks. “This point is intelligent and has all the information that we need, and we don’t need the paper anymore.”

 

Kristen Scott is one of the student mappers and is loving the task of graveyard wandering. “It’s actually a lot of fun and, I mean, we spend so much time in the classroom in our computer lab throughout the year that getting out into the field like this is really exciting, we’ve always had gorgeous weather.”

 

Scott knows the information they are currently compiling will one day help someone who is clueless as to where their loved one is buried. The GPS location they are recording will lead the person to the correct plot. In the future, they hope to compile a database available online for public use.