Geospatial Software Developer

Job Title: Geospatial Software Developer

Client: USGS GHSC Advanced National Seismic System

Location: Lakewood, CO – remote position is possible.

Travel: Occasional travel to Lakewood or conferences, possible.

Citizenship: US or Green Card / Permanent Resident – must pass a background investigation.

Education (If required): BA or BS required. Preferably in scientific discipline.

Description: The Advanced National Seismic System (ANSS) centered at the USGS National Earthquake Information Center, in Golden, Colorado, has the unique mandate to produce rapid earthquake information products for all significant earthquakes. These information products (Near-Real-Time Products) now include automatic shaking intensity maps (ShakeMaps), reported intensity maps ("Did You Feel It?") estimated losses (PAGER), Ground Failure, and ShakeCast. These systems are used by government and non-government emergency planners, responders, utility operators, transportation engineers, and other critical users for post-earthquake situational awareness and to help prioritize their level of response and inspections.

Up-to-date experience with the evolution of key operational ingredients, including geospatial libraries in Python, continuous integration/continuous deployment pipelines in GitLab, and methods for handling large datasets. Interacts frequently with a small research and development group at the USGS Geological Hazards Science Center in Golden, Colorado to provide users’ feedback to USGS and centrally implement new developments, database improvements, and improvements to the user experience. Each system requires state-of-the-art geospatial, shaking, and loss databases that require enhancements, updating, processing, and metadata developments.

Qualifications:

5+ years as a professional software developer in scientific programming, interactions with scientists, and writing well-documented, efficient, and reliable, software. Knowledge of 508 compliance rules.

• Expertise on numerical modeling with geospatial data.
• Developing and modifying open-source programs and libraries in Python.
• Experience in collaborative software development using Git.
• Experience with Docker containers and GitLab CI/CD pipelines.
• Configuring and modifying application, scripts, and subsystems for cloud deployment.

Tasks:

• Contribute to revamping the Global Vs30 Mosaic Repository software. The Repository needs to be ported to Python, refactored, modularized, and optimized to expand its functionality and improve maintainability. The Global Vs30 mosaic is a highly cited and requested product used by Global ShakeMap (and thus PAGER), by GEM’s OpenQuake, and numerous risk modelers worldwide.
• Develop Python Tiling Library. Improve the performance of current codes, allowing needed product improvements. Develop higher resolution models and an optimized tiling system to load full grid data into memory.
• Reconstitute the Ground-Failure Road Obstruction software. The Ground-Failure Road Obstruction Product, developed circa 2019, is complex and no longer functional. Tasks are to update code in a modern Python environment, optimize calculations to reduce run time, pre-process global road data, and install the code in a container.
• Document software updates and fixes in the GitHub repository. Documentation will fully describe new/updated functionality.

Major Technologies/Experience:

Python, Geospatial data, GitHub source control, GitLab CI/CD pipelines, Docker, AWS, cloud deployment, C, Makefile, GMT calls