Navigation Resources

Chart No. 1, incorporates the symbols contained in the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO). Where appropriate, each page lists separately the current preferred U.S. symbols shown on charts of the National Ocean Service (NOS) and the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA). Also shown in separate columns are the IHO symbols used on foreign charts reproduced by NIMA. For more information regarding the use of the chart, the practice of navigation, chart sounding datum, and visual and audible aids to navigation, the user should refer to NIMA pub. No. 9 - American Practical Navigator (Bowditch).

File Size - 37.6 Mb.

Quite simply, this is the acknowledged bible of marine navigation worldwide. No other publication offers such a detailed look into the various types of navigation used today. From deduced (dead) reckoning to electronic to celestial navigation.

File Size - 41.2 Mb.

The United States Coast Pilot, published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), in conjunction with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), is a series of nine nautical volumes that cover a wide variety of information important to navigators of U.S. coastal and intracoastal waters, and the waters of the Great Lakes.

Most Coast Pilot information cannot be shown graphically on the standard nautical chart, and is not readily available elsewhere. The topics in the Coast Pilot include, but are not limited to, channel descriptions, anchorages, bridge and cable clearances, currents, tide and water levels, prominent features, pilotage, towage, weather, ice conditions, wharf descriptions, dangers, routes, traffic separation schemes, small-craft facilities, and Federal regulations applicable to navigation.

Average file size - 17.0 Mb per Volume.

Distances Between United States Ports is published by the Office of Coast Survey, National Ocean Service (NOS), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Distances Between United States Ports contains distances from a port of the United States to other ports in the United States, and from a port in the Great Lakes in the United States to Canadian ports in the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River.

File Size - 1.6 Mb.

The international rules are applicable on waters outside of established navigational lines of demarcation. The lines are called COLREGS Demarcation Lines and delineate those waters upon which mariners shall comply with the Inland and International Rules. COLREGS Demarcation Lines are contained in this book.

The Inland Rules in this book replace the old Inland Rules, Western Rivers Rules, Great Lakes Rules, their respective pilot rules and interpretive rules, and parts of the Motorboat Act of 1940. Many of the old navigation rules were originally enacted in the last century.

File Size - 991 Kb.

The purpose of the International Code of Signals is to provide ways and means of communication in situations related essentially to safety of navigation and persons, especially when language difficulties arise. In the preparation of the Code, account was taken of the fact that wide application of radiotelephony and radiotelegraphy can provide simple and effective means of communication in plain language whenever language difficulties are not an issue.

File Size - 1.2 Mb.

Lights and other marine aids to navigation, maintained by or under authority of the U.S. Coast Guard and located on waters used by general navigation, are described in the Light List. These volumes include aids located in the waters indicated.

Included are all Coast Guard aids to navigation used for general navigation such as lights, sound signals, buoys,daybeacons, and other aids to navigation. Not included are Coast Guard mooring buoys and some buoys having no lateral significance, such as special purpose, anchorage, fish net, and dredging.

Average file size - 2.2 Mb.

These charts are not intended to be used alone but in conjunction with other navigational aids. These charts present, in graphic form, averages obtained from data gathered over many years in meteorology and oceanography to aid the navigator in selecting the quickest and safest routes. Included are explanations of how to use each type of information depicted on these charts.

You can either download a particular month or select to download the entire set of 13.

Average file size - 11.5 Mb per chart.

This table lists the bridges, their schedules, and restrictions along the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway (AICW) from Norfolk, VA to Miami, FL and then onto Key West.

This table lists the bridges and locks, their schedules, and restrictions along the Okeechobee Waterway from it's intersection with the AICW in Stuart, FL to the GICW at Fort Myers, FL.

This table lists the bridges, their schedules, and restrictions along Florida's GICW from it's intersection with the Okeechobee Waterway at Fort Myers, FL then North to Dunedin, FL.

Lock and distance information for the Erie, Champlain, Oswego, and the Cayuga-Seneca Canals

This section also includes information on the Federal Lock at Troy, NY

Sailing Directions are published by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) under the authority of Department of Defense. Sailing Directions cover the harbors, coasts, and waters of foreign countries of the world and provide information that cannot be shown graphically on nautical charts and is not readily available elsewhere.

Sailing Directions (Planning Guides) are intended to assist mariners in planning ocean passages and to eliminate duplication by consolidating useful information about all the countries adjacent to a particular ocean basin in one volume.

Sailing Directions (Enroute) include detailed coastal and port approach information which supplements the largest scale chart produced by the National Geospatial - Intelligence Agency.

The Welland Canal is a major shipping canal joining Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. It offers the only reasonable alternative to the Erie Canal for vessels with MHH’s above 15.5 feet that are up bound or down bound in the Great Lakes. Transit information.