Witch Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Out of curiousity, does anyone here-or elsewhere-use Google Earth to look at destinations? To get an idea of the terrain enroute? To find potential landing areas? To do sightseeing? To waste time at work? Later Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
helicodger pilot Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 I've tried Google Earth to check routing in mountain areas, but I couldn't get a low enough view angle to be real helpful. By the time you've zoomed down to a low enough "altitude" to see any detail, you have a pretty small field of view, too. Then again, maybe I just don't know the tricks of using GE Looking at the vacant lot next to my office was more helpful in that it showed me where the nearby buildings and houses are and helped me plan approaches in advance, but --- the street light poles don't show up from orbit! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goldy Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Out of curiousity, does anyone here-or elsewhere-use Google Earth to look at destinations? To get an idea of the terrain enroute? To find potential landing areas? To do sightseeing? To waste time at work? Later All of the above...to find old wreck sites, to check out real estate for sale, to peek into my neighbors curtains....yepp, my own personal satellite in the sky ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelFire_91 Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Curious, Did you just read the article in AOPA's Flight Training? They just had an article in the latest issue about using Google Earth to look at the area around airports or landing sites for escape routes, and places to land in the event of an emergency. And to answer your question, Yes. I use google earth for everything, finding cool places to land, looking at old crash sites, finding what lane I need to be in to make my turn when getting directions. Everything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slick1537 Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Go to flightcentral.net and click on their flight planning section, you can select to airports and click the google earth icon. It will bring google earth with a line across you flight path so you can zoom in and get a better idea of what your checkpoints will look like from the air. There are also some other cool features on there. Check it out! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
delorean Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Our company uses it at all hours of the day......In the dispatch center they have three 70" LCD monitors on the wall that have the paid for version of Google Earth (runs super fast.) It's overlayed with the 100 helicopters all with satellite tracking. Then, they can overlay radar, front movement, hospitals, TFRs, base location, the company's regions, etc. They can also view the helicopters routes/tracks for any previous number of hours. They have a special 3D mouse (like used for CAD) to zoom, tilt, and pan. They can use it to help find LZs and other places that don't line up with the coordinates. They can give us a description of hospital helipads in busy metro areas where may have three hospitals and pad all within a 1/4 mile of each other. VERY fun to play with and they're finding new things they can do with it everyday. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gomer Pylot Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 I use it a lot, for many things. I use it to look at geocache locations, for just looking at different places, and for checking scene, hospital, and PR locations. It's nice to be able to actually see the place you're going to be landing beforehand, and get an idea of landmarks, obstacles, etc. It's a great resource, and would be even better if the photos were newer. The newest I've seen are several years old. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
K-38 Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Our company uses it at all hours of the day......In the dispatch center they have three 70" LCD monitors on the wall that have the paid for version of Google Earth (runs super fast.) It's overlayed with the 100 helicopters all with satellite tracking. Then, they can overlay radar, front movement, hospitals, TFRs, base location, the company's regions, etc. They can also view the helicopters routes/tracks for any previous number of hours. They have a special 3D mouse (like used for CAD) to zoom, tilt, and pan. They can use it to help find LZs and other places that don't line up with the coordinates. They can give us a description of hospital helipads in busy metro areas where may have three hospitals and pad all within a 1/4 mile of each other. VERY fun to play with and they're finding new things they can do with it everyday.That impressive. Kudus to them for effective implementation of developing technologies. I use it to "pre fly" my flights to unfamiliar areas if I have enough advance notice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nbit Posted December 3, 2007 Report Share Posted December 3, 2007 Don't know how well this fits into the thread, but I have found the sectional chart overlays for Google Earth excellent for teaching students how to visualize airspace in 3D when used in conjunction with a sectional chart. Especially where the airspace is more complicated (i.e. - as around say, Miami/Fort Lauderdale, Atlanta, etc..), where B, C, D, E, overlap. You can pan, tilt, & zoom to see what the airspace looks like. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparker Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 Don't know how well this fits into the thread, but I have found the sectional chart overlays for Google Earth excellent for teaching students how to visualize airspace in 3D when used in conjunction with a sectional chart. Especially where the airspace is more complicated (i.e. - as around say, Miami/Fort Lauderdale, Atlanta, etc..), where B, C, D, E, overlap. You can pan, tilt, & zoom to see what the airspace looks like.Teach me how! Teach me how! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HelliBoy Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 (edited) Here it is.......be careful though-its not always up to date so dont try to print it out and clip your kneeboard. No heli route charts tho- be a lot cooler if they did. Edited December 4, 2007 by HelliBoy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelFire_91 Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 Don't know how well this fits into the thread, but I have found the sectional chart overlays for Google Earth excellent for teaching students how to visualize airspace in 3D when used in conjunction with a sectional chart. Especially where the airspace is more complicated (i.e. - as around say, Miami/Fort Lauderdale, Atlanta, etc..), where B, C, D, E, overlap. You can pan, tilt, & zoom to see what the airspace looks like. Yeah, I do that also, it's freaking awsome to be able to visualize it in 3D with a sectional. Really helps new comers, as well as old farts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChopperJ Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 Can you get it to show Class D also? I only see Class B and C plus some restricted areas. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FUSE Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 I love Google Earth, been using it for years. Does anyone know if there is a way for it to show TFR's? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenacious T Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 I have used Google Earth to get long/lat coordinates in order to program waypoints into the GPS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
delorean Posted December 4, 2007 Report Share Posted December 4, 2007 I love Google Earth, been using it for years. Does anyone know if there is a way for it to show TFR's? Yep.....Don't know how, but it will. One of the best tools out there is the new HEMS ADDS. http://www.weather.aero/hems/ It's made for low altitude flight and uses calulations off all the local ASOSs to map visibility, ceilings, winds, etc over the entire country, but you can zoom in, down to the county level. The colors change based of the level of what you're viewing, and you loop the changes over the last 12 hr to find trends (It's hard to explain, but imagine a radar loop that showed visabilities or ceilings with levels rather than the intensity of precip, get it?) It will overlay TFRs, PIREPs, ATC bounderies, roads, rivers, etc. Very cool program made for the EMS industry, but useful to just about anyone operating under about 5000 AGL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
K-38 Posted December 5, 2007 Report Share Posted December 5, 2007 Yep.....Don't know how, but it will. One of the best tools out there is the new HEMS ADDS. http://www.weather.aero/hems/ It's made for low altitude flight and uses calulations off all the local ASOSs to map visibility, ceilings, winds, etc over the entire country, but you can zoom in, down to the county level. The colors change based of the level of what you're viewing, and you loop the changes over the last 12 hr to find trends (It's hard to explain, but imagine a radar loop that showed visabilities or ceilings with levels rather than the intensity of precip, get it?) It will overlay TFRs, PIREPs, ATC bounderies, roads, rivers, etc. Very cool program made for the EMS industry, but useful to just about anyone operating under about 5000 AGL.Wow that is a really cool resource that I did not even know existed. Thank you for sharing that. I am going to check it out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlyNHighNFast Posted December 6, 2007 Report Share Posted December 6, 2007 Delorean: Thanks for the heads up on the HEMS tool, that is a great resource. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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