RESPEC Project

RESPEC designed, fabricated, and installed a robust extensometer system to monitor the potentially unstable slope of a dry sinkhole threatening a historic home. The custom extensometer system continually monitors for slope movement at multiple locations near the sinkhole’s edge. The real-time instrumentation system uses a cellular modem to facilitate two-way communication and data upload directly to RESPEC’s EagleIO dashboard platform. EagleIO displays data in a dashboard and monitors data for sinkhole movement. If movement exceeds a predefined threshold, notifications are sent to both the client and RESPEC instrumentation engineers.

RESPEC developed custom extensometers which monitor movement at multiple locations between the sinkhole and the historic home using sensors mounted at the data logger. This increased the simplicity and durability of the system while decreasing chances of instrument loss or failure. The equipment was installed in southern Louisiana, a challenging environment due to extreme humidity, high temperatures, hurricane force winds, and insects and critters that like to build homes in everything while leaving nothing unchewed. The system was installed in 2014 and remains functional today, attesting to the ruggedness and longevity of Campbell Scientific equipment and RESPEC design.