More than 80.000 US Army Corps of Engineers surveys, integrated and updated every week, can be overlaid on your nautical charts to show you the best route in complex areas.
NOTE: It is necessary to have an active Master subscription to have access to the USACE surveys.
The USACE districts, distributed in the whole US, are in charge to regularly survey the inland navigation channels system. Especially in those areas where the bottom changes frequently due to the weather or some river estuarine, USACE performs a depth survey and publish it as soon as possible to inform about the status of the navigation channel.
The Aqua Map - USACE surveys service aims to inform as soon as possible the captain about the new survey data. The surveys overlaid on the official map permit a better evaluation of the dangers, to properly plan the route in risky areas.
NOTE: all the USACE districts are in charge to upload their surveys as soon as possible into the eHydro USACE database. However, we experienced with some district a delay in the upload, up to several weeks, while others upload their new surveys in few days.
The USACE surveys are composed by a set of depth areas displayed with bright colors from dark red (very dangerous, usually below 3 feet) to blue (above 15 feet) and spot soundings.
Here below the color scale (you can find it in the USACE Settings page).
The USACE layer in Aqua Map is produced integrating all the USACE surveys from the late 1990 till today. The integration is done to always have on top the latest (more recent) survey available.
USACE Settings
From the general Settings page you can open the USACE Settings page, where you can set all the drawing parameters.
At the top of this page you have the switch to enable the overall USACE functionality.
Then you have a section with the drawing options:
- Display USACE: to enable the overlay of the USACE data on the map.
NOTE: if you disable the drawing but you keep the USACE functionality ON, the data will continue to be updated by the app so that, when enabling the drawing you will have the most updated data. If you disable the functionality no updates will be done. - Select max age: to select the oldest surveys to be overlaid to the map. You can select "All" (no filter, all surveys will be drawn), "3yr" (do not display surveys older than 3 years), "1yr" (do not display surveys older than 1 year), "months" (enter a number of months to be used as filter).
- Enable fading: to enable the fading of the USACE surveys, so that older surveys are more transparent. This option will allow to have a better understanding of the surveys age just looking to the map.
NOTE: in any case is possible to get the exact survey date tapping on the depth data on the map.