BISMARCK, ND ( KXNET ) — The North Dakota Department of Water Resources (DWR) will soon take to the air in its attempts to help find new deposits of groundwater supplies.

The department has scheduled a series of survey flights as early as the week of July 8, which involve a helicopter towing a large hoop-shaped antenna roughly 100 feet over the ground. This antenna sends and receives electromagnetic signals that characterize geology found beneath the land.

The study will be conducted by Aqua Geo Frameworks — a company that specializes in airborne geophysical surveys. The helicopter used for the survey will be operated by specially-trained pilots, and all flights are ensured to be safe and follow U.S. law. The surveys will not take place directly above populated areas.

The flight survey will include approximately 1,455 miles flown in a grid pattern, and cover parts of Cass, Richland, Ransom, and Sargent Counties. The results will provide useful imagery and details on materials below the surface of the Earth. These, the department states, will be used to help map buried glacial deposits that contain valuable groundwater supplies.

“AEM surveys have become an important tool in groundwater investigations,” said DWR Director Andrea Travnicek. “The large amount of data we have collected over the past several years has been used to make sound scientific decisions concerning the management, investigation, and appropriation of the state’s groundwater resources.”

For more information on the survey or the devices that will be used, visit the DWR’s website here .

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