Helm carries depth on inland water. Launch on a reservoir, a river or the intracoastal and the water itself has contours, shading and a depth number on it, drawn from state lake elevation surveys and read against the draft of your own boat.
Helm merges four sources and reports what is under the keel now, with the date the measurement was taken. Inland, each source carries a different part of the load.
| Source | What it covers inland |
|---|---|
| State lake elevation data | Reservoirs and inland lakes surveyed by state agencies. This is the source that puts contours and a depth number on a lake. |
| USACE eHydro | Army Corps dredging and channel surveys. Rivers and maintained channels, often the most recent measurement anywhere on the chart. |
| NOAA ENC | The official chart for the coast, the intracoastal and navigable rivers, with aids to navigation and channel limits. |
| NOAA CO-OPS live tide | The water level now, wherever tide reaches. That includes tidal stretches of rivers and the whole intracoastal. |
Every reading carries its survey date, so you can see how recent the measurement under you is. Helm also surfaces CATZOC, the chart's own confidence rating, which records how a survey was done and the confidence that goes with its depths.
Enter your draft once and it stays on the chart. Helm shades the water your boat cannot cross, plans routes around it, and reports the shallowest point along any line you draw. On a lake, that shading is what puts the shoal on the screen while you still have room to turn.
A reservoir drawn down in late summer. The creek channel you ran in June is still the same line, and with your draft entered the shoulders on either side shade while the channel stays open.
A river with a bar that moved over the spring. eHydro surveys are the freshest depth on that stretch, and Helm shows the survey date next to the number before you commit to the inside of the bend.
A lake you have never launched on. You plan the run at the kitchen table the night before and arrive at the ramp knowing where to slow down.
Drop a start and a destination and Helm routes around the water your draft cannot cross: around the flat at the mouth of a cove, along the deep side of a bend, out of the shallows and back into the channel.
The measure tool handles the rest. Draw a line across a cove or from the ramp to the far bank and you get distance, bearing and a depth profile along it, with the shallowest point marked rather than averaged.
Helm has 161 downloadable chart packs. Once the pack covering your water is on the device, the charts, routing, depth shading, the measure tool and the anchor alarm all work with no cell service. You download the packs for the water you actually run, at home on wifi.
Set an anchor radius and Helm wakes you if you drag. It runs on GPS, so a narrow cove is exactly where it does its job. When the wind clocks around at two in the morning and the boat swings across its scope, you find out from the alarm.
Depth, speed over ground and course over ground sit on one strip. AIS puts live vessel traffic on the chart with position, vessel type and movement status, so a tow under way around the next bend reads differently from a barge lying still, and the area you are looking at refreshes about every ten seconds. Satellite and night chart styles both work inland, and satellite is the one to use along an unfamiliar shoreline. Every trip is recorded to a logbook you can replay afterward.
Save a spot when you find fish and read the depth contours around it. Saved spots, markers, routes and the logbook sync across your devices, so the spot you marked from the phone is on the iPad next season.
Helm animates wind, wave and current overlays on the chart, with a multi-day strip of three hour columns for wind, gusts, air temperature and rain, plus water temperature. On a big reservoir in July the useful question is what the wind does at four o'clock, and that is a column you read before you leave the dock.
On tidal water, the tide comes from NOAA CO-OPS against MLLW and the current arrows turn with the time you scrub to, so you can pick the hour you leave the dock and the hour you come back through the inlet.
Helm has a CarPlay interface that puts the chart on the vehicle's built in screen. On the tow to an unfamiliar lake, the water and the ramp you are heading for are on the dashboard.
Helm. It carries lake depth from state elevation surveys, shades water your boat's draft cannot cross, routes around it, and runs offline once the chart pack for the lake is downloaded.
Depth data. Inland lakes come from state elevation surveys, so you get contours and a depth reading on the water itself. Rivers and maintained channels also pick up USACE eHydro dredging surveys.
Yes. Download the chart pack for your area first and the charts, depth, routing, the measure tool and the anchor alarm all keep working with no signal. There are 161 packs.
Yes. The intracoastal and navigable rivers are on NOAA charts, with eHydro surveys for dredged stretches and the live NOAA CO-OPS tide wherever tide reaches. Inland lakes come from state elevation data.
Yes. Set a radius and it wakes you if you drag. It runs on GPS, so it works in a cove with no service.
Yes, natively on iPhone and iPad. Routes, markers, saved spots and the logbook sync across your devices, so a run planned on the iPad is on the phone at the ramp.
Helm Boating