Assignment
The West Plains is located just west of Spokane and includes Airway Heights, Medical Lake, Cheney, and the Fairchild Air Force Base. The West Plains area occurs at the boundary of WRIA 54-Lower Spokane River Watershed, WRIA 56-Hagman Creek Watershed, and WRIA 34-Palouse River Watershed. The purpose of the geophysical orientation survey was to help determine the most suitable geophysical technique or techniques to use in regional mapping of the geologic and hydrogeologic characteristics underlying the West Plains area. The objective is to evaluate various geophysical techniques for their suitability to map the crystalline bedrock contact across the West Plains.

Our Role
We helped Spokane County better understand the available groundwater resources in the West Plains, particularly the connection between surface water and groundwater.  The geophysical methods used included microgravity, seismic reflection, transient electromagnetics, ground penetrating radar, and electrical resistivity imaging.