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Story: Modern mapping and surveying

GPS equipment, 1989

Image
GPS equipment, 1989

The Global Positioning System (GPS) was invented by the United States military and uses satellite data to accurately locate positions on the earth. Here a Department of Survey and Land Information surveyor inspects the large and cumbersome equipment needed in the 1980s.

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library, Dominion Post Collection (PA-Group-00685)

Reference: EP/1989/1762/34A

by Jon Hargest

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Melanie Lovell-Smith, Modern mapping and surveying – Later developments, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/18919/gps-equipment-1989 (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Melanie Lovell-Smith, published 1 March 2009, updated 1 August 2018.