I’m doing a topo of a development. There are several ponding basins around the development but it has been raining quite a bit these days over here so it’s all filled with rain water.
My question is, will the LiDAR scan consider the top of the water as the surface or will it penetrate to the actual surface?
It will not penetrate water. You’ll get the ground around the edge but if you need a full pond as-built you’ll need to wait until it’s empty or use conventional survey methods.