SOW_FY23_NGA_Portable_LiDAR_20230614.docx

UNCLASSIFIED

Commercial Portable Airborne Bathymetric LiDAR Survey

STATEMENT OF WORK

Exploring Drone-Capable LiDAR Package Capabilities

3 May 2023

Contents

Portable Airborne LiDAR Survey This document identifies the scope of work, performance requirements and deliverables for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) Commercial Portable Airborne Bathymetric LiDAR Survey. This document outlines the requirements for LiDAR data systems, collection, processing, production, and reporting. The Contractor shall supply all equipment and personnel to collect and process LiDAR data over features as identified by the Government that enhance the mission of the NGA.

Background The Department of Defense (DoD)’s NGA has an ongoing need to collect a wide range of intelligence from maritime locations around the world. Specifically, NGA’s Maritime Safety Office (SFH) is responsible for providing Safety of Navigation (SoN) products and services to the U.S. Navy and mission partners around the globe as required by US Title 10. Unfortunately, over 70% of the Earth’s oceans have not been mapped to an acceptable resolution for navigation safety. Traditional survey ships or deployed buoys have been utilized; however, these methods can be costly, dangerous or limited in real-time adaptability capabilities. Utilizing commercial LiDAR for hydrographic/bathymetric survey missions, in addition to traditional methods, will ultimately shorten the timeline to provide SoN information to the fleet. The capability to field LiDAR on autonomous or piloted drones is an emerging and desirable technological solution, one which has been minimally assessed to date.

Scope The objective of this effort is to collect hydrographic data over coastal features in the navigable coastal ocean environment of a nation NGA serves as a prime charting authority for. The goal is to obtain bathymetric LiDAR depths such that navigationally relevant hazards can be identified and assess the capabilities of drone-portable LiDAR sensor package for this mission. The Contractor shall provide NGA with data collected from a portable LiDAR system which is capable of being affixed to a remote-piloted or autonomous aerial drone covering the coastal areas identified in this statement of work. See Appendix A for Technical Specifications details. Upon mutual agreement of NGA and the performer, boat-based multibeam sonar survey may be used to supplement LiDAR in heavy traffic maritime navigation lanes and areas within the AoI options. The Contractor shall provide LiDAR data with uncertainty referenced to the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) orders established for hydrographic surveys in the IHO Standards for Hydrographic Surveys (S-44 Ed.6, reference Appendix B). If multibeam SONAR survey is conducted alongside LiDAR, that data shall also follow IHO standards required from LiDAR collections as they apply for SONAR-based hydrographic survey.

Survey Planning and Activities

0. Area of Interest (AOI) This activity covers hydrographic and oceanographic survey data to cover coastal areas of the nation of Haiti (Appendix C).

0. Platform Requirements The Contractor shall prepare the survey aircraft with the necessary sensors to perform the designated mission as laid out in the schedule of deliverables (sec. 6.2) or as assigned at kick-off survey planning meeting. The aircraft used in this contract may be a piloted airplane, a remote piloted aerial drone, or an autonomous aerial drone. Regardless of vehicle, the LiDAR sensor package itself must have a demonstrated capability of fit to an aerial drone system (piloted or autonomous). LiDAR sensor packages which are not portable and which do not have a demonstrated ability to be readily affixed to drone platforms will not be considered for this work. Tandem multibeam SONAR capable vessels shat be prepared as mutually agreed upon at kick-off survey planning meeting.

0. Coordination, Communication, Kick-off NGA virtual and/or onsite survey planning kick-off meeting, conducted by the NGA Contracts Officer Representative (COR), NGA Technical Point of Contact (TPOC), and Naval Oceanographic Office (NAVOCEANO) TPOC will be held no later than two weeks after award to Contractor representatives to discuss, identify, and document survey logistics and planning. The NGA-NAVOCEANO mission team, COR, and/or TPOC participation are required for survey planning and survey data collection for each specified area. The Contractor shall make itself available for the kick-off and for teleconferences to discuss production and technical issues as needed. Coordination of these meetings will be established between the Contractor and the NGA-NAVOCEANO mission team, COR and/or TPOC. NGA will be available for teleconferences to discuss production and technical issues as needed and will also be available as needed during deployment of the platform for coordination purposes and to provide guidance for the mission when needed.

0. Preliminary Mission Review The Contractor shall host a Preliminary Mission Review (PMR) no later than 30 days prior to initiation of a respective mission, so as to troubleshoot and mitigate risk, ensuring the probability that a respective mission will result in operational success. The Contractor shall assess the feasibility of surveying in the AoI and present those findings and/or recommendations during the PMR.

Technical Requirements Platform Mobilization The Contractor shall share their technical plans to prepare the aircraft with the necessary sensors to perform the designated mission profile category within 60 days after award and prior to their survey start date as assigned by the COR at kick-off survey planning meeting. The Contractor shall provide its own supporting facilities, office space, aircraft support and supporting vehicles / vessels, if necessary, for its own operations and include those costs in the contract submission package. The Contractor may deploy its aircraft and vehicles from reasonable deployment areas of their choosing. The Contractor shall utilize the most effective means of transport, logistics, LiDAR collection, and data processing.

Data Collection The configuration of specific hardware aboard the aircraft is to be mutually agreeable between Contractor and NGA as planning and mobilization are conducted. This can be assumed to include but not limited to: portable LiDAR suite, motion reference unit, positioning/GPS solutions, RGB imagery, etc. Additional sensors/solutions to reduce data uncertainties are acceptable and will be mutually agreed upon by Contractor and NGA as long as they provided additional value. The Contractor shall report the procedures taken to minimize positional error. The Contractor shall operate during reasonable environmental conditions. The Contractor may determine during what conditions operations are not reasonable due to being unsafe or resulting in unacceptable collection quality.

Safety and data quality shall always be emphasized over data quantity. The Hydrographer shall never subject personnel or vessels to undue risks and hazards.

NGA requires sensor data to be collected and delivered as outlined in table 3.2 below.

Table 3.2 – Data Collection Requirements for LiDAR

Data Processing Once the aforementioned data collection activities have been performed, the Contractor shall process and evaluate the quality of the data, with the ongoing guidance of the NGA and NAVOCEANO TPOCs, and include the following activities:

· Pre-processing to refine and resolve system biases and offsets

· Application of water level corrections

· Evaluation and editing of erroneous returns in LiDAR data

· Identification of features significant to Safety of Navigation

· Assessment of data uncertainty

· Assessment of data coverage

· Comparisons with charted information

Hydrographic data shall be evaluated against thresholds outlined in IHO Standards for Hydrographic Surveys, Special Publication 44 (S-44 current edition). If multibeam SONAR data is delivered, it shall be processed following the requirements for LiDAR to meet standard IHO quality and metadata best practices.

Processed LiDAR deliverables shall comply with table 3.3 below.

Table 3.3 – Data Requirements for Processed LiDAR Deliverables

Deliverables

0. Data and Survey Report Formats A Report of Survey (ROS) shall be generated (to be delivered no later than 12 months after award) which documents all activities associated with the survey. The ROS shall include information on collections, data processing, quality assessment, and deliverables. At a minimum, ROS content shall include survey dates, asset identifiers, equipment models and identifiers, system configuration, sensor / platform offset information, vertical / horizontal datum information, time reference, sounding units, sensor calibration / patch test information, data processing environment and parameters, sensor / environment bias corrections, water level corrections, editing methodology, data density assessment, depth uncertainty assessment, listing of hydrographic features and hazards, and comparisons with other hydrographic information (charts and other sensor data).

A listing of required deliverable data types and formats is provided in table 3.4.1 below. All items in this table shall be delivered no later than 12 months after contract award

Table 3.4.1 – Deliverable types and formats

Format

0. Government Purpose Rights Under this contract, the Contractor is to deliver to Hydrographic Data and derived products to NGA. However, notwithstanding any contrary language in a standard commercial license, NGA shall have “government purpose rights,” (GPR) as that term is defined in 48 C.F.R. 252.227-7013, to any geospatial information NGA extracts from the Hydrographic Data provided that the extracted geospatial information (i) is irreversibly modified and uncoupled from the original source Hydrographic data and (ii) contains no reference or attribution to the producer or provider of the Hydrographic data.

0. Data Ownership The deliverable data and finished products created under this effort shall be retained as NGA property and shall be used and maintained by the Contractor solely for executing these requirements. Ownership of the data and finished products shall not pass to the Contractor.

0. Acceptance Criteria Acceptable data reflects sufficient sounding density and spatial coverage to meet navigation safety standards outlined by the IHO. Acceptability of delivered data will be determined by compliance with table 3.4.2 along with Appendices A and B.

Table 3.4.2 – Performance Requirements Summary (PRS) / Acceptance Criteria SUV Deliverables – Acceptance Matrix

Reporting Requirements Monthly Status Report The Contractor shall report status to the satisfaction of these requirements via monthly reports. Monthly reporting shall include the period’s progress towards the overall mission completion, onboard collection systems status including any technical activity, and asset configuration adjustments, onboard events of notable consequence or interest while underway, expenditures and expected completion date. Either the Contractor or NGA may schedule an ad hoc Technical Exchange Meeting (TEM) as needed. Report information shall also include, but is not limited to:

The Contractor shall deliver this report to the NGA Program Manager and Contractor Officer’s Representative in electronic form on a monthly basis. The first report is due 50 days after award and on the 20th of each month thereafter.

Program Schedule Report In conjunction with the monthly status report, the Contractor shall deliver a project schedule which identifies the deliverables, activities, and milestones. The schedule should include the projected start and finish dates as well as the actual start and finish dates. The Contractor may use any scheduling tool (e.g., MS Project, Asana, etc.) to complete this task. The first schedule is due 50 days after award and on the 20th of each month thereafter.

Quality Assurance / Quality Control Plan The Contractor shall coordinate with the TPOCs to develop a plan for quality assurance and quality control no later than 60 days after award and prior to data collection. The plan will outline the Contractor’s calibration and surveying methods (development, cross lines, reference surfaces) and equipment operational status documents, including but not limited to the calibration report for the LiDAR, the GPS receiver’s subscription package or general GPS quality (as applicable) and information on the acquisition software onboard to ensure the quality of the data collected. The Contractor shall perform data quality inspections prior to requesting acceptance of the work by NGA. Contractor-performed inspections are independent of those performed by the Government.

Program Management Requirements The Contractor shall assign a Program Manager (PM) to act as the single primary interface with the NGA mission team and CORs. The Contractor PM specifically has the responsibility of interfacing with NGA on all matters pertaining to this SOW, as well as the planning and execution of this mission. The Contractor shall utilize standard processes based on industry best practices wherever applicable.

Security Requirements Classification and Distribution Government supplied information and the information developed under this statement of work will be UNCLASSIFIED//CUI. No information, products delivered, or services performed may be disclosed by any means without prior approval of the appointed COR and NGA. All collected data during the deployment of Contractor USVs for this mission, including transits, are considered Distribution C, which means distribution is limited to the Government and Government contractors only.

Information Assurance / Information Security The Contractor shall protect DoD sensitive unclassified data regardless of the location or ownership of the transport media, including, but not limited to Contractor owned/leased mobile computing devices and removable storage media. The Contractor shall comply with all current information assurance and information security policies, procedures, and statutes applicable to DoD information technology, including the July 3, 2007 DoD CIO Policy Memorandum on Encryption of Sensitive Unclassified Data at Rest on Mobile Computing Devices and Removable Storage Media.

Information Markings The Contractor shall mark the data, products, reports, and transfer media properly as UNCLASSIFIED//CUI, and include the following statement:

"Distribution authorized for US Government agencies and their contractors for Contract Performance Evaluation awarded on mm/dd/yyyy. Other requests for this document shall be referred to Director Maritime Safety Office NGA.".

Security Plan The Contractor shall provide a security plan which covers the physical, data, and legal efforts made to ensure project security. This plan shall include physical security measures to ensure the safety of vehicles and mission crew while executing tasks related to this project. This plan shall also include data security and handling measures intended to protect and properly handle data collected as part of this project as detailed above (SOW 5.1-5.3). This plan shall additionally include intended efforts to make all necessary legal arrangements to operate to, from, and within the AOIs required in this SOW. Acquisition of any and all permits, permissions, or other required documentation under local, national, and international law in furtherance of contracted activities are the sole responsibility of the Contractor.

Delivery Recipient of Deliverables Data delivery shall be made in a mutually agreed upon format unless otherwise directed by the Contract Officer in writing. This may comprise an agreeable network-based (e.g., FTP, transfer portal, etc.) or physical media deliveries (e.g., hard drive, optical disc, etc.). All physical media and materials generated shall be shipped to the following address. Physical packages must include a label outside of the package (Outer Label) and a label inside the package (Inner Label):

Inner Label:

NGA/L-59

3838 Vogel Rd Arnold, MO 63010-6238 Attn: Gilman Ouellette Jr., 314-676-8724

Outer label:

NGA/L-59

3838 Vogel Rd Arnold, MO 63010-6238 Attn: Security/Registry

Schedule of Deliverables

SCHEDULE OF DELIVERABLES – USV SURVEYS

Appendix A – Technical Specifications for LiDAR Survey Purpose: The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA) has identified dynamic coastal areas in prime charting authority national waters that require timely survey. NGA in its Title 10 authority has an obligation to maintain accurate safe for navigation products for all US Navy vessels as well as maintaining charting authority responsibilities with several other nations through joint agreements. Timely survey of changing coastal areas is crucial for maintaining safety of navigation products covering these waters. Bathymetric LiDAR has a proven track record of collecting coastal bathymetric data within IHO standards to resolve potential hazards to navigation in coastal ocean locations.

Survey Procedure

1. NGA may issue the survey requirements as a pre-defined polygon AoI feature.

2. The survey area polygon shall be mutually agreeable between performer and NGA.

3. IHO Order 1 or better is required for the surveyed area.

4. Sufficient survey line coverage is required to verify and delineate hazards to navigation including identifying a least depth for shallow (< 20m depth) hazard features

a. A least depth must be established. This may be an obstruction, wreck, pinnacle or other obstruction of navigational significance, or simply the area of least depth.

b. Survey lines should maintain horizontal spacings in order to meet coverage requirements of IHO Order 1 or better. Additionally, NGA requires any transient/temporary features in the data be disproven by the performer.

c. Cross check lines must be run perpendicular to the survey lines at a linear spacing mutually agreed upon between Contractor and NGA.

5. Safety and data quality shall always be emphasized over data quantity! The Hydrographer shall never subject personnel or vessels to undue risks and hazards.

Reporting of Hazardous Feature

1. If at any point during operations, an uncharted feature of less than 20m is observed, it is considered an urgent danger to surface navigation. A Naval message (examples below) must be sent to NGA NAVSAFETY within 24 hours. navsafety@nga.mil

a. This is to include survey area and transit to survey area (only if LiDAR is operational). Depth and position required, position precision should be to hundredths of minutes, if possible.

Hazardous Feature Reporting Submission Examples.

1. 10.6 METER DEPTH REPORTED IN 50-44.8N 001-16.9E.

1. DEPTHS REPORTED:

1. 13 METERS IN 57-02.10N 006-09.51W.

1. 18 METERS IN 57-04.36N 006-11.65W.

1. 15.5 METERS IN 57-04.93N 006-12.52W.

1. UP TO 25 METERS LESS THAN CHARTED IN AREA BOUND BY

3. 57-04.0N 006-24.0W, 57-08.5N 006-24.0W,

3. 57-04.0N 006-32.0W, 57-08.5N 006-32.0W.

Appendix B – IHO Standards for hydrographic surveys (S-44)

Appendix C – AreaS of interest

LiDAR Bathymetric Survey AoIs (Latitude/Longitude in decimal degrees)

AoI Option 1: Cap-Haitien North. Total Area: ~20km2

AoI Option 2: Port-au-Prince Coast. Total Area: ~200km2

AoI Option 3: Jérémie Coast. Total Area: ~200km2

AoI Option 4: Jacmel Coast. Total Area: ~100km2

AoI Option 5: Aux Cayes Coast. Total Area: ~450km2

AoI Option 6: Miragoâne Coast. Total Area: ~230km2

AoI Option 7: Les Cayes Coast, West. Total Area: ~500km2

AoI Option 8: Gonâive Island, South. Total Area: ~250km2

AoI Option 9: Port-au-Prince, Approach. Total Area: ~900km2

AoI Option 10: Quisqueya. Total Area: ~50km2

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