Hello to anyone that actually reads this my name is James and I’m an intern with the city of Delaware more specifically I’m working with the Delaware fire department. Since this is my first post I’ll try my best to keep it short and sweet.

My first day at the internship was great I got to meet Michelle (my boss) and we talked about how she is using ArcGIS to map buildings and more specifically mapping all relevant information that the fire department would need to know about those buildings in case of an emergency, like where are the utility shutoffs, know boxes, water hookups, hazardous material, building entrances and exits, and etc.

After talking about how Michelle was using the software she let me take a shot at actually mapping out buildings. My first task was to map Lazarus Park. During the mapping process Michelle showed me quite a few interesting ways of manipulating ArcGIS to make the mapping easier. I was very surprised at the scale of the mapping itself. Lazarus Park is a relatively large area but in comparison to the entire city of Delaware it is quite small and I can’t imagine how long it is actually going to take to accurately map all of Delaware.

Though I’ve taken GIS classes at school it is really nice to actually get to use the things that I’m being taught in a real world scenario. With that being said this internship has opened my eyes that there is a lot about the ArcGIS system that I just don’t know and I really enjoy that. It gives me a chance to look for a solution or way to solve a problem and if I can’t find an answer I can ask Michelle because she is a Pro at using ArcGIS.

Anyways that is all for now and I hope that y’all are having a great day.