Proposal for a comprehensive vertical datum for North America, Central America and the Caribbean

As part of its Ten Year Strategic Plan (2013-2023), the National Geodetic Survey (NGS) of the USA is planning to replace the North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD 88) by the year 2022. The replacement vertical datum will be defined through a gravimetric geoid model and accessed via GNSS technology, in direct contrast to the definition and access of NAVD 88, which is through passive, generally unmonitored benchmarks connected through geodetic leveling. A USA-Canada-Mexico joint effort is underway to compute a single geoid model by 2022 for the entire region, which can be adopted as the vertical datum reference surface by all countries within the area. The proposed area ranges from the North Pole to the Equator and from the Aleutian Islands (in the west) to the islands of Newfoundland (in the east). As such, the entirety of the Caribbean Sea, all of Central America, all of Hawaii, plus parts of Greenland and South America will be covered. This will allow one singular, unified vertical datum to be accessible to every country in the region, alleviating the need for island-by-island vertical datums as is currently the case. A major component of the geoid modeling effort is NGS's GRAV-D project (Gravity for the Redefinition of the American Vertical Datum). That project has a two-fold approach: First, to collect a static, accurate "snapshot" of the entire gravity field. This is primarily being done through airborne gravity collection over the USA and its territories, as well as through improvements in and additions to terrestrial data holdings. A second, long-term effort of GRAV D is to monitor the geoid over time. This talk will discuss the prospects of improving the static gravity field holdings outside of the USA and its territories, including a discussion on existing holdings, data gaps and NGS's desire for potential collaborations with interested countries in the region both before and after the 2022 datum change.