The 1998 field season focused on an intensive survey of the Wadi Fidan - the main drainage in the Jabal Hamrat Fidan (JHF) research area. The Wadi Fidan is part of one desert drainage which in known by a variety of names that flows through the Faynan region of Jordan. It begins high up on the Edomite plateau and is called the Wadi Dana. It flows westward to the lowlands of Edom where it is called the Wadi Faynan and then continues for approximately 10 km to 'Ain Fidan (the spring of Fidan) where it becomes known as the Wadi Fidan.

During the 1998 season, when Dr. James Anderson (North Island College, BC, Canada) joined our expediton as the Senior Surveyor, the JHF project made a commitment to implementing a wide range of digital technologies liked to Geographic Information Systems (GIS). With the help of GIS analysts Mark Waggoner and Neil Smith from the UCSD Geisel Library GIS Laboratory, GIS now forms to nexus of data storage and analysis for the JHF project.