Dewberry has announced that it has been awarded multiple task orders from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) under the Geospatial Products and Services Contract (GPSC) to perform airborne geophysical surveys in portions of Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Texas, and New Mexico, for the USGS Earth Mapping Resources Initiative (Earth MRI).

“Earth MRI is a play on words, as people are familiar with the use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to image inside the human brain,” explains Dewberry Project Manager, David Maune, Ph.D., PSM, PS, GS, CP, CFM. “Dewberry is excited to support USGS in its mission to assess critical minerals using airborne geophysical survey technology.” 

For this project, Dewberry will perform very low altitude magnetic and radiometric surveys from a fixed-wing aircraft and a helicopter with towed-array sensors in order to image subsurface geologic structures in search of undiscovered critical minerals and rare earth elements vital for the electronics industry.

These projects, which will be used to evaluate the potential for undiscovered critical mineral deposits contributing to an understanding of the major mineral systems for the two regions, are expected to be completed in early 2021.