Some years ago I was working for a government agency (not the one I'm at now). A Project Manager sent a topographic survey out to an Engineering Firm. This is a good firm, they do good work. People make mistakes and there were plenty to go around.
An Engineer in our office asked me if I would spend the day with him at a mountain Park next to a natural lake. This lake has a published BFE on the FIRM. The department was proposing a new visitor's center on the shore of the lake and it had to be above BFE (even the State can't thumb their nose at FEMA or the local Water Resources Control Board). The Engineer wanted to take some spot shots and see if this project is even feasible before lots of money was spent on project plans. So I go on the NGS website and there is a benchmark right there on the public road adjoining the site and it is only a few hundred feet from the proposed building site. We go up there and find the elevations are very close to BFE but there is a few spots slightly above BFE. The Engineer happens to be a FEMA flood expert from when he worked in a private engineering firm that specialized in flood studies.
The project manager orders the topo saying nothing about how to determine elevations (being a business major with no idea about engineering issues). The firm does good work and they supply a fine topo with elevations based on OPUS at a control point. The benchmark (which is a line of them up and down the road) is only 300' from the edge of their topo limits. Frankly I think the survey firm should have noticed there is a big lake next to the area they are topo'ing and suggested maybe we should use the RMs on the FIRM (which are the NGS BMs).
So the Engineer mentioned previously is reviewing the topo and our spot shots and notices there is about a 1' discrepancy which makes the site much drier than it really is. He asks me about it. I look at the map which is honest in that it says right on the map it's based on OPUS. I explain the likely issue and forget about it. The next day me and the Engineer get called into the Deputy Director's office (he is a whole separate story, a real arrogant piece of work) and get chewed on like it's our fault his project manager and consultant conspired to mess up. Why did we go up there with out authorization seemed to be his main problem with us (sometimes it's easier to beg for forgiveness than ask permission). I am pointedly assigned to investigate. The whole thing kind of took me aback. He was upset because of politics. I'm not bitter or anything like that.
So I write up a report and the upshot is me and the private surveyor go up there and run a benchmark circuit from the first benchmark through their control point to the next benchmark and back. I more or less showed that me and the engineer did our preliminary investigation properly and the topography was based on inappropriate control for the needs of the project. The Deputy Director never apologized for being a jack-___ but that's par for the course, I guess.
After he got fired (at will ha ha) for an illegal hire he came back to visit and I happened to have to ride up with him in the elevator. He tried to be smiley and friendly but I just ignored him. One of the Engineers (a different one) took him and his hand-picked minions on and he actually filed a cooked-up complaint against her with the Board which promptly threw the complaint out as nothing but BS. She was the rank & file engineer that got him fired which is saying something, don't mess with a woman scorned.
