Land and Navigation
Speaker’s notes
Contours on the map are the brown lines drawn on a map connecting points of equal height above sea level. They are labelled with the height and with the topes of the figures uphill. A contour labelled 500 is 500m above sea level, and every place on that contour is precisely 500m above sea level. On a 1: 25, 000 map, they are usually 10m apart.
If contours are very close together that means the hill is steep. However, is they are wide apart, it has a gentle gradient.
When describing direction, the normal method to use if by taking bearings. If you look at the housing of compass you can see that it has 360 tiny divisions on it. Bearings are one of the useful and the most accurate of describing directions. They are always given as three figures so that they should have 0 as the first figure if they are less than 100.
Regarding conventional signs, they are small symbols, shapes or signs on a map which have specific meaning. They are usually listed down the right-hand side of a paper map. It is important that you learn them as it will make your map reading a lot easier and improve your map skills that are necessary if thinking of joining uniformed services in the future. Depending on the map, different conventional signs are used. The bigger the scale is, the smaller the conventional signs are.
The Ordnance Survey produces a range of maps that are particularly important to the uniformed services in one way or another. Those types of maps include:
Route in a scale of 1: 625, 000 which is one of the smallest scales even though the numbers seem so big. This specific map is suitable for long distances as well as motorway driving. It would be very useful for the armed forces, who might be based in the south and want to do exercises in the Scottish Highlands. Main roads are clearly marked on this map, but there are few small details.
Road in a scale of 1: 250, 000 with
Contours on the map are the brown lines drawn on a map connecting points of equal height above sea level. They are labelled with the height and with the topes of the figures uphill. A contour labelled 500 is 500m above sea level, and every place on that contour is precisely 500m above sea level. On a 1: 25, 000 map, they are usually 10m apart.
If contours are very close together that means the hill is steep. However, is they are wide apart, it has a gentle gradient.
When describing direction, the normal method to use if by taking bearings. If you look at the housing of compass you can see that it has 360 tiny divisions on it. Bearings are one of the useful and the most accurate of describing directions. They are always given as three figures so that they should have 0 as the first figure if they are less than 100.
Regarding conventional signs, they are small symbols, shapes or signs on a map which have specific meaning. They are usually listed down the right-hand side of a paper map. It is important that you learn them as it will make your map reading a lot easier and improve your map skills that are necessary if thinking of joining uniformed services in the future. Depending on the map, different conventional signs are used. The bigger the scale is, the smaller the conventional signs are.
The Ordnance Survey produces a range of maps that are particularly important to the uniformed services in one way or another. Those types of maps include:
Route in a scale of 1: 625, 000 which is one of the smallest scales even though the numbers seem so big. This specific map is suitable for long distances as well as motorway driving. It would be very useful for the armed forces, who might be based in the south and want to do exercises in the Scottish Highlands. Main roads are clearly marked on this map, but there are few small details.
Road in a scale of 1: 250, 000 with