Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 August 2015
In 1975 F. J. Kerr and P. F. Bowers of the University of Maryland made a full coverage survey of the neutral hydrogen in the southern hemisphere between ±10° latitude from 240° to 350° in longitude. This survey taken with the CSIRO 18 meter telescope is still in the reduction stage but when completed it will provide an ideal complement to the full ±10° coverage of the northern sky by H. Weaver and D. R. W. Williams (1973). The possibility of a unified analysis of the outer region of the Galaxy has inspired this present study. The plan here is to use the ±10° Weaver-Williams survey in the region 10° < ℓ < 130°; the ±30° extension to this survey (H. Weaver and D. R. W. Williams, 1974) in the region 115° < ℓ < 245° and finally the Kerr-Bowers survey, 240° < ℓ < 350°. Since the latter survey is incompletely reduced at this time we have only used profiles at 5° intervals in longitude and thereby have produced a preliminary determination of the plane in the southern hemisphere. The northern hemisphere determination is complete.