The GPS station at the Pyramid Geodetic Laboratory

A permanent GPS (Global Positioning System) station was installed near the Ev-K2-CNR Pyramid Laboratory in 2002. This point has been surveyed on several occasions since 1991, and in 1992 it was linked to a beacon of the DORIS (Doppler Orbitography and Radio Integrated on Satellite) for which global solutions are calculated monthly or even weekly. The results obtained from the GPS station in May 2004 outlined a shift of 4.2 cm per year from the point surveyed 12 years earlier, which is in very good agreement with the shift of the DORIS beacon and with the plate tectonics theory. Two weeks of data from the Pyramid GPS recorded in May and September 2005 were processed with reference to the Lhasa IGS station. They pointed out that the earthquake which occurred in Indonesia did not produce any meaningful movement of the Himalayan mountain range.