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Cell Tower Maps ...

Avocet

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In the course of planning a portfolio shoot, I came across this site. When I see an obstruction icon on a sectional I know its location is only approximated - close by not always close enough. This site will let you plug in a zip or city and state and show tower locations. I cannot guarantee exactness here either, but if you cross check it with GoogleEarth or Maps you can usually see the tower shadow and get proximity to a satisfactory degree - PROVIDED you are not trying to film the tower itself. This would require site visits at a minimum I would think.

Cell Tower Maps
 
I noted that two towers in my immediate vicinity were missing. This is a good tool but not completely reliable.
 
In the course of planning a portfolio shoot, I came across this site. When I see an obstruction icon on a sectional I know its location is only approximated - close by not always close enough. This site will let you plug in a zip or city and state and show tower locations. I cannot guarantee exactness here either, but if you cross check it with GoogleEarth or Maps you can usually see the tower shadow and get proximity to a satisfactory degree - PROVIDED you are not trying to film the tower itself. This would require site visits at a minimum I would think.

Cell Tower Maps
A data base with tower height would be sweet.
 
A data base with tower height would be sweet.
Indeed, thus my comments about reliability. One can, however, usually find these towers on a VFR sectional which will have AGL data most of the time. Between the sectionals, digital satellite views and this site, we can get pretty close to safe methinks.
 
Yeah, but cell towers multiply like rabbits, very few will show on sectionals.


It's ironic you say that. I was going to a job site this morning and I rounded a turn and WHAM there's a new tower in an area where nothing was but a few weeks ago. I had noticed that I had great cell service where it was "marginal" last time. Now it all makes sense. . .
 
Correct me if I"m wrong, but I thought a tower had to be a certain height before it would be placed on a sectional. Example, there was a radio antenna that was about 400 feet high close to one of the farms I sprayed, it wasn't on the sectional, however. Crop dusters are generally the only ones that would be flying low enough for that antenna to be a problem.
 
Correct me if I"m wrong, but I thought a tower had to be a certain height before it would be placed on a sectional. Example, there was a radio antenna that was about 400 feet high close to one of the farms I sprayed, it wasn't on the sectional, however. Crop dusters are generally the only ones that would be flying low enough for that antenna to be a problem.

The icons for obstructions on VFR sectionals do not indicate the nature of the obstruction in all cases. Electrical obstructions have a unique icon with a "bolt". There are plenty of sub-400AGL obstructions on the charts and as I mentioned before, I usually try to cross reference these with a satellite image (GE). The timeline for both of these sources, however, is circumspect

Today, although fogged and rained out of a planned portfolio shoot I had planned in a nearby harbor, I stopped in at the site anyway to get a feel for just how inaccurate the Litchi Map might be. Sure enough, trees had grown - grown a lot - and to make matters even more interesting, a huge salvage barge had sailed up to the site less than 48 hours ago and had a nice 60 foot crane extended upright and left in that position no less than 15 meters or so from my final waypoint. The barge appeared to be docked, uninhabited at that spot. Try again when the weather clears later this week.
 

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