EarthNC (short for “Earth & Sea”) recently released marine charts for the entire US and Virgin Islands for Google Earth. These charts come on a CD for a much lower price than typical vector chart data, and they take full advantage of the Google Earth platform for viewing the data. Now EarthNC has announced a new web site which allows you to view the Google Earth content through a web browser. EarthNC is using a very neat plug-in from GoogleEarthAirlines which allows you to view and control Google Earth through a web browser. Go to EarthNC’s online page and follow the instructions. Once the plug-in is installed when you view the window you hit a button that starts up Google Earth in the background but shows the output on the browser. Then, using buttons on the screen you can turn on and off layers including the EarthNC Marine Charts, and several other interesting layers developed by EarthNC like weather, vessel tracking, and more.
The Google Earth browser functionality works quite well, and EarthNC’s different layers are impressive. The Marine Charts are limited in the online version to harbor charts and basic navigational data. You don’t see the full spectrum of data available such as depth contours, fish havens, wrecks, soundings, etc. unless you purchase the EarthNC Plus or EarthNC Pro (available soon) versions.
I also encourage you to check out GoogleEarthAirlines which first developed the browser plug-in for Google Earth.
About Frank Taylor
Frank Taylor started the Google Earth Blog in July, 2005 shortly after Google Earth was first released. He has worked with 3D computer graphics and VR for many years and was very impressed with this exciting product. Frank completed a 5.5 year circumnavigation of the earth by sailboat in June 2015 which you can read about at Tahina Expedition, and is a licensed pilot, backpacker, diver, and photographer.
Too bad it is not MAC OSX compatible. I verified this with the developer of the plug-in.