Connock, Gregory

Dr. Gregory (Greg) Connock is a Geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in the Virginia – West Virginia Water Science Center. Prior to joining the USGS in 2021, he worked in the Energy sector for 4 years as a basin and reservoir modeler interposed by two phases of graduate study (M.Sc. and Ph.D.) at the University of Oklahoma where he specialized in paleoenvironmental reconstructions using fossil lipids and pigments. Greg’s introduction to land subsidence investigations began through the lens of counterbalanced borehole-pipe extensometers in 2021, when he oversaw the drilling and construction of an extensometer over a major pumping center in eastern Virginia. This experience ignited a burning interest in subsidence monitoring and modeling that led Greg to create the USGS Land Motion Team in 2022. His current research interests center on the expansion of Virginia’s subsidence monitoring network, which includes the development and installation of state-of-the-art integrated hydrogeodetic facilities, termed ‘Land Motion Observatories, where extensometers, multi-level observation wells, c-GNSS stations, and SAR corner reflectors are collocated. These facilities will be used to isolate individual subsidence-inducing processes, such as aquifer-system compaction and glacial isostatic adjustment, to improve projections of vertical land motion (i.e., subsidence and uplift) through time and across space. Time-series data from the expanding subsidence monitoring network will inform the development of a coupled machine-learning and physics-based groundwater model to predict the deformation response of the aquifer system to a range of groundwater withdrawal and recharge scenarios. This integrated approach forms a core theme of Greg’s perspective on land subsidence studies, with another core theme centered on facilitating the application of subsidence science by decisionmakers tasked with safeguarding coastal communities from subsidence-related hazards. Greg’s pursuit in reducing subsidence-rate uncertainties through equipment collocation and identifying sources of nonlinearity in the subsidence record represents an initial step towards resolving the challenge facing resiliency planners, especially in highly vegetated regions like Virginia, where relatively low subsidence rates are difficult to accurately monitor.