Go West, NASA

JACKSON, Miss. -- The Lewis and Clark expedition was a two-year journey into a new frontier that helped put the West on the map. Now NASA is trying to do the same for the historic trek.

Scientists are using high-resolution satellite images to help pinpoint and map possible camp sites along the trail of the expedition, which is approaching its 200th anniversary.

NASA has conducted such space archaeology in the past, locating roads built by Pueblo Indians in New Mexico and Arizona more than 1,000 years ago.

"Conducting archaeology from space is an exciting concept," said Lewis and Clark archaeologist Ken Karsmizki, a curator at the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center in The Dalles, Ore. "Our efforts to uncover Lewis and Clark outposts are enhanced using this technology."

NASA's Stennis Space Center on Mississippi's Gulf Coast is working with Karsmizki and the center on the project, which will continue until at least 2004, when the nation marks the journey's bicentennial.

Geographically incorrect

Meriwether Lewis and William Clark started from St. Louis in May 1804 and eventually reached the mouth of the Columbia River in what is now Washington state. Their 3,700-mile odyssey ran into several snags along the way, including grizzly bears, harsh winters and choppy waters that made navigation nearly impossible.

Karsmizki, who has examined sites along the expedition in Montana, Oregon, North and South Dakota, Idaho and elsewhere, said many of the duo's journal entries were written after long, grueling days on the trail and contain geographical inaccuracies.

NASA is combining precision satellite imagery with detailed historic maps to help Karsmizki locate camp sites.

In some cases, the technology can reduce a potential dig site from several square miles to a matter of only acres.

"By comparing data from the expedition archives to NASA imagery, we improve our probability of finding an outpost location dramatically," Karsmizki said.

NASA's Earth Science Applications Directorate is providing the images to Karsmizki and his team. Marco Giardino, ESAD's acting deputy director at Stennis, said NASA scientists can create a 360-degree view of an area where the explorers traveled.

"From that view, archaeologists can follow the trails as if they were flying over the actual landscape, in real time and in any direction or angle they choose," Giardino said.

Color is extremely important in locating historic sites. For example, a slight difference in the shade of wheat in a large field may indicate the location of an outpost.