The Los Gatos Creek
Trail is a pretty heavily used trail for runners and bicyclists. There was
a constant stream of people going by us as we deployed the instruments.
Most of them didn't even seem to notice us. Californians.
Some spots along the trail were paved, and some were just dirt. Either way it was still a pretty nice place to be working, and the weather was pretty cooperative.
The trail, and its associated faults, traveled through and past your normal types of places. The Forbes Flour Mill in Los Gatos was one of them.
The flour mill was the first of several places where we had to leave the trail and drive the ATV through town to get to the next section of the route.
Public parks like Versona Park in the photograph below were along the route.
This spillway was downstream from the park. The areas on either side of the creek were pretty heavily populated.
Over hills...
...and under roads.
The shot holes were also in regular places. Some, as in the photograph below, were out in seemingly deserted lots. There were a couple of different groups deploying instruments. Here Rufus and Silvia are leaving some food next to the shot hole casing for another group to pick up.
This shot hole above was in Versona Park. The shot holes were all about 10-15 meters (30-40 feet) deep, and were loaded with about 22 kilograms (50 pounds) of explosives. They were in parks, in trailer parks, empty lots, high school football fields, and peoples' backyards.
We laid out instruments until way after dark.
The shots were made during the night. The time"windows" began at midnight. The Texans were programmed to come on at midnight, record for 40 seconds, and then sleep until two minutes after midnight, record for 40 seconds, etc. This pattern was repeated five times, then that group of five recordings was repeated eight times during the night. Roughly 30 minute breaks were programmed between the groups to allow the people setting off the explosions to move from one shot hole to the next. There were 11 shot holes, but only four shooters.
2014-08-01