ICGSM 2026 – Course Program

Tuesday 9 June 2026

Colorado School of Mines, Green Center - Friedhoff Hall

Morning

8:00-8:30               Official Opening of the Exhibition Area

8:30-9:30               Welcome & Introductions [P. Mazzanti, T. Simmonds]

• • • • Meet your contemporaries
      • Meet the exhibitors
      • Overview of the program for the next 3 days

9:30-10:00            Geotechnical and Structural Monitoring: Present and Future trends [P. Mazzanti]

• • • • What we learned from the past
      • How we monitor today (tools and techniques)
      • Where we may go in the future (emerging technologies)

10:00-10:30          Coffee Break (sponsored by Specto Technology)

10:30-11:30          Design of a monitoring program: the right start [G. Pezzetti]

• • • • Building an effective monitoring plan
      • Why, what, where, when and how
      • Validate assumptions and use data to modify the project before problems arise

11:30-12:30          Monitoring sensors: make the right choice [P. Mazzanti, T. Simmonds]

• • • • What are the measurement parameters
      • Environmental considerations (durability)
      • Range, accuracy, precision and response times

12:40-13:40          Lunch Break

Afternoon

13:40-14:40          Installation of monitoring systems: let them work [G. Hlepas]

• • • • Define the critical, or high risk/failure prone zones to ensure maximum coverage
      • Considerations for power supply and data transmission 
      • Provide access for cleaning, calibration, maintenance and repair

14:40-15:40          Acquisition and Management of monitoring data: let them flow [V. Bateman]

• • • • Manual vs automated measurements (benefits and challenges)
      • Data validation, integrity and storage
      • Governance and security

15:40-16:00          Coffee Break

16:00-17:00          Translating Data into information: let them speak [M. Derby]

• • • • Establish KPIs and Baselines
      • Implement Intelligent Alerting
      • Analyze, troubleshoot, review and refine

17:00-18:00          Exhibition and networking time

Wednesday 10 June 2026

Colorado School of Mines, Green Center - Friedhoff Hall

Morning

8:00-8:45               Official Opening of the Exhibition Area

8:45-10:00            Q&A session with experts*

10:00-10:30          Coffee Break

10:30-11:30          Monitoring Project challenge (part 1 - T. Simmonds):

1. “Adapting wireless slope monitoring for avalanche-related track obstruction decision support on the Alaska Railroad” by Jacob Russett (Eddyfi Corp) - Author(s): Jacob Russett, Ali Tehrani
2. “El Paso Landslide Monitoring” by Carley Burford Nevarez (Geo Instruments)- Authors: Seth Bernard and Paul Thurlow
3. “Lessons Learned During Urban Development Around Curved Tunnels” by Sean Johnson (WSP, GEI Consultants) - Authors: Sean Johnson (WSP), Hunter Mason (GEI Consultants)
4. “Abundant Data Where Power, Comms, and Access Are Scarce: Arctic Vibration Monitoring Case Study” by Ren Keyport (Omnidots) – Author(s): Erik Williams (beadedcloud), Ren Keyport (Omnidots)
5. “Comparison of Surface Displacement Monitoring Techniques at a Canadian Block-Cave Mine” by Julian Lusardi (BGC Engineering) - Author: Julian Lusardi

11:30-12:30          Monitoring Project challenge (part 2 - T. Simmonds):

1. “Real World Monitoring Project Challenges: Instrumentation Pitfalls & Fixes” by Walt Packer (Campbell Scientific, Inc.) - Author: Brent Randall
2. “Challenges and Lessons Learned from a Fully Automated Instrumentation and Monitoring System in Urban Tunnelling” by Zoe Melo (GEO-Instruments) - Author: Zoe Melo
3. “From Data Silos to Site Intelligence: Integrating Instrumentation and Tailings Dam Construction Workflows” by Matthew Ondercin (Cambio Earth) - Author(s): Katie Burkell, Chris Gairns, Matthew Ondercin
4. “Real-Time Hybrid Geotechnical Monitoring for Dry Stack Pile Foundations: Integrating 3D Distributed Fiber Optic Sensing with Conventional Point Instruments” by Wilson Soares Jr (G5 Engenharia)- Author(s): Wilson Soares Jr, Giovanni Marquesi

12:30-14:00          Lunch Break

Afternoon

14:00-15:00           Monitoring Technology challenge (part 1 - P. Mazzanti):

1. “Measuring the In-Situ Response of Rock Bolts during Tunnel Construction Using Distributed Fibre Optic Strain Sensing” by Bradley Forbes (BGC Engineering) - Author(s): Bradley Forbes, Nicholas Vlachopoulos (Royal Military College of Canada)
2. “Sentinel-AI: the new LLM agent system in geotechnical engineering for the monitoring, evaluation and analysis of measurement data.” by Andre Lüttmann (DMT) - Author: Karsten Zimmermann
3. “Continuous Measurement and Analysis of Structural Movement in Linear Infrastructure?” by Martijn Arkesteijn (Basetime) - Author: Martijn Arkesteijn
4. “FOM-MEM: A Novel Fiber-Optic Matrix for 3D Mapping of Rotational Seismic Events in Geotechnical Monitoring” by Paweł Zinówko (ELPROMA Electronics) - Author(s): Prof. Leszek R. Jaroszewicz (PhD Eng DSc) – Team Leader, Anna Kurzych (PhD Eng), Michał Dudek (PhD Eng), Karol Konarski, Tomasz Widomski (M.Eng), Paweł Zinówko (Eng)
5. “A new deployment method to enhance railway track profile monitoring utlizing Wireless Tiltmeters” by Ali Tehrani (Eddyfi Technologies) - Author(s): Ali Tehrani and Sadaf Shafie

15:00-16:00           Monitoring Technology challenge (part 2 - P. Mazzanti):

1. “A Standardized Interoperability Layer for Instrumentation Data” by Aaron Yu (IMSURGE) - Authors: Aaron Yu & Steph Schnabel
2. “Near Real-time Underwater Instrumentation” by Paul Thurlow (Geo Instruments) - Author: Paul Thurlow
3. “Field-Ready Solar Power Kits for Reliable Geotechnical Monitoring” by Eric Boucher (Specto Technology) - Author: Eric Boucher
4. “A New Textbook Resource: Fundamentals of Automated Field Instrumentation” by Brent Randall (Campbell Scientific) - Author: Brent Randall
5. “Linking Vibration to Structural Fatigue Accumulation: Innovative Decision Support Project Makes Pipeline More Resilient in First Year of Service” by Erik Williams (beadedcloud) - Author: Erik Williams

16:00-16:30           Coffee Break

16:30-17:00           Awards of Project and Technology challenges**

17:00-17:15           Conclusions and remarks

Thursday 11 June 2026

Field Trip

7:30 AM Departure from Golden, CO.

Morning session: Arrival at Pueblo Dam and morning session.

Embankment Instrumentation Tour

• Overview of embankment geology and its influence on instrumentation layout
• Walk with stops at wells, drains, and key deformation and pressure monitoring points
• Demonstration of inclinometer equipment (manual and automated systems)
• General discussion of piezometers and data collection approaches

Crest Walk with LiDAR Demonstration Area

• Short ascent to the crest with views of dam structure and monitoring locations
• Walk past a LiDAR tent and associated equipment for a brief show-and-tell
• Discussion of measurement points installed along the crest and parapet walls
• Overview of dam operations, crest-level monitoring practices, and structural monitoring points

Dam Gallery Tour

• Walkthrough of interior gallery areas
• Overview of internal instrumentation such as jointmeters, uplift gauges, seepage, and drainage monitoring
• Discussion of automated data acquisition systems and example outputs

Lunch: Lunch break.

Afternoon session:

Remote Sensing Data Collection Presentations & Discussion

• Presentation and comparison of infrastructure monitoring techniques including LiDAR, photogrammetry, InSAR, and others
• Overview of example datasets and typical monitoring applications

Departure: Return trip from Pueblo Dam.

Expected arrival in Golden: 4:30 PM – 5:00 PM (traffic dependent).