ISSS608 2017-18 T3 Assign Miko Tan Mei Jia
VAST Challenge 2018 MC2: Suspense at the Wildlife Preserve
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Like a Duck to Water
Mistford is a mid-size city located to the southwest of the Boonsong Lekagul Wildlife Preserve. The city has a small industrial area with four light-manufacturing endeavors. Mistford and the wildlife preserve are struggling with the possible endangerment of the Rose-Crested Blue Pipit, a locally loved bird. The bird’s nesting pairs seem to have decreased alarmingly, prompting an investigation last year implicating Kasios Office Furniture, a Mistford manufacturing firm. Since the initial investigation, the situation has evolved: Kasios insists that they have done nothing wrong! They assert that grad student Mitch Vogel and his professors are mere media-seekers trying to draw attention away from their lackadaisical research. Kasios presents itself as an extremely eco-friendly organization. They have launched their own very public investigation into the issues raised last year and are reporting very different results!
According to Kasios, those funny colored satellite images from the Preserve only prove that it is a diverse, changing habitat and that the peculiar images Mitch identified are not conclusive evidence of any wrongdoing. They argue that the other industries should be taking as good care of the area as Kasios corporate and its volunteer squads do year round. To show their goodwill, Kasios reports that they recently donated staff time and money to refurbish ranger stations and campgrounds across the Preserve! Does Kasios have a case here? Perhaps some new visualization of river contaminants and analyses within the Preserve may help illustrate that the new Kasios story doesn't hold water (or does it?).
Mini Challenge 2 Background
Last year, the Kasios Furniture Company was implicated in environmental damage to the Boonsong Lekagul Wildlife Preserve for both dumping toxic waste and polluting the air with chemicals from its manufacturing process. But Kasios is not taking these accusations lying down, and they deny any accusation of industrial waste dumping! Kasios’ spokespersons state that there isn’t any ground contamination near the remote ranger station that was suggested by last year’s mini-challenge 1 and 3 participants, and they have inspected that area and found it as pristine as the rest of the preserve.
Outraged ornithology professors from Mistford College journeyed out to look over the dumping site themselves and perform soil analyses. They returned to report that the site looked like there had been recent excavation and building activities going on. Boonsong Preserve rangers later confirmed that a new ranger station was being built at that site! Soil samples taken from the site were inconclusive in detecting Methylosmolene (the toxic manufacturing chemical in the suspected dumping) or any other contaminant, as new top soil had been trucked in.
With a primary piece of evidence against Kasios now gone, investigators will need to take another approach. Professors in the Mistford College Hydrology Department have come forward with several years of water sensor readings from rivers and streams in the preserve. These samples were taken from different locations scattered throughout the area and contain measurements of several chemicals of possible interest, but they have never been analyzed due to lack of funding. Could visual analytics help reveal something in this data that could make up for the soil evidence that was destroyed?
Map of the Preserve
Stations:
- Achara
- Boonsri
- Busarakhan
- Chai
- Decha
- Kannika
- Kohsoom
- Sakda
- Somchair
- Tansanee
List of measures recorded by sensors in the Preserve
