Illustration Solution · For policyholders, adjusters and contractors
Documentation your adjuster can work from.
A flight returns dated, geotagged imagery of the whole roof and a radiometric thermal pass indicating retained moisture. Both go into a numbered condition report. It is produced at the direction of the policyholder, their adjuster or their contractor. It is documentation only. We record what the roof shows. The licensed and qualified parties read it, price it and take it to the carrier.
- Visible sensor
- 48 MP
- seam and surface detail
- Aircraft thermal sensor
- 640 × 512
- radiometric
- Method
- ASTM C1153
- infrared roof moisture
- Deliverable
- Condition report
- PDF + findings CSV
What a file carries, and what it is missing.
The usual file is what most roofs arrive with. A documented record is what a condition report puts in front of the people reading it.
The usual file
A documented record
- Photographs with no capture date attached to them, taken by several people over several visits.
- Every frame carrying its own date and coordinates, from flights whose conditions and settings are logged in the report.
- A scope built on what was visible from the edge of the roof. A supplement raised later when something else turns up.
- The full surface documented in one pass. What is on the roof is in the file the first time it is read.
- Retained moisture argued from a ceiling stain, which is rarely under the place water entered.
- A radiometric thermal pass outlining where the assembly is holding heat consistently with moisture, flagged for a core.
- No record of the roof before the loss, so its prior condition is a matter of recollection.
- A pre-loss baseline flown while nothing is wrong, which is what makes "before" a document rather than an argument.
- A warranty submission assembled from whatever imagery the contractor happened to keep.
- A consistent, repeatable record in the form manufacturers and building owners expect to receive.
Method
One method, whoever instructs it.
The visible pass images the whole roof at fixed altitude and overlap. Zoom detail covers seams, flashings, penetrations, drains and mechanical curbs. Every frame carries its capture date and coordinates.
The thermal pass is flown at night, on our roof-survey conditions. About an hour after sunset, after a day of sun, with no appreciable rain in the previous 24 hours and wind under about 15 mph. Wet insulation gives the day’s heat back slowly, and that is the contrast the sensor records. Suspect areas are reported as suspect until a core confirms them.
Both passes register to the same scaled plan, and the findings are numbered on it. Every party reading the file is looking at the same place on the same document.
What you receive.
- PDF 01 Numbered condition report Findings located on a scaled roof plan and rated for urgency. Conditions, equipment, emissivity and reflected-temperature settings logged beside them.
- JPEG + GeoTIFF 02 Dated, geotagged imagery set The full roof surface with zoom detail on every seam, flashing, penetration and curb. Each frame carries its capture date and coordinates.
- PDF + DXF 03 Moisture map Suspect wet areas outlined on the same plan, with the estimated wet area totaled. Verification readings against each one where cores or probes were taken.
- CSV 04 Findings table Every numbered finding with its location, category and verification status. A form an adjuster or a contractor can work from directly.
Stated before you commission it.
Questions we are asked
What buyers ask before they call.
Q1 Are you adjusters?
No, and the distinction is worth stating plainly rather than leaving you to work out. Idaho licenses adjusters, including the ones who represent a policyholder in a claim. That is a different job from ours. We are a documentation vendor. We fly the roof, measure what is there, and hand the record to whoever engaged us. That is the policyholder, their adjuster or their contractor. We do not investigate claims or put a value on one. We do not advise on coverage or speak to a carrier on anyone’s behalf. If you need someone to represent you in a claim, you want a licensed adjuster. We are happy to be the documentation they work from.
Q2 Our scope is in dispute. Can you help?
We can put the roof on record, which is usually what a scope disagreement is short of. A flight produces dated, geotagged imagery of the full surface and a thermal pass indicating retained moisture. Everything is numbered and located on one plan. Both sides then read the same document. What that document means for the scope is worked out by your contractor and your adjuster. We supply the measurements, not the argument.
Q3 Can this support a supplement?
It is one of the more common reasons this gets commissioned. Supplements usually turn on conditions nobody documented the first time. The field of the roof, an area the ladder never reached, moisture that was never mapped. A flight covers the surface uniformly and the thermal pass reads the assembly. The conditions are recorded with their date and location attached. Your contractor or adjuster takes it from there.
Q4 Will this satisfy a manufacturer warranty submission?
It gives you a consistent, dated, repeatable record of measured conditions, with the method and settings logged. That is the shape a warranty file is usually asked to take. Whether a particular submission is accepted is between you and the manufacturer. We do not rule on warranty coverage.
Q5 What is a pre-loss baseline, and why would we pay for one?
It is the same flight, flown while nothing is wrong. The value shows up later. When a storm does come through, the condition of the roof beforehand is a document rather than a recollection. The difference between the two flights is visible rather than argued. It also shows duty of care: the roof was being looked at on a schedule. That matters to owners and managers well beyond any single claim.
Q6 Do you charge based on the outcome of the claim?
No. We are engaged and paid for the flight and the document, on the same basis as any other inspection. Nothing about what we charge depends on what happens to a claim afterwards. Tying a fee to a claim outcome would put us on the wrong side of the line we work inside.
Q7 Is this a survey?
No. Our photogrammetric outputs document conditions for planning and comparison; they are not land surveys and are not offered as survey-grade or authoritative. Idaho reserves that word to licensed practice, and boundary or certified-elevation work is performed by a licensed Idaho professional land surveyor.
Who this is for
Written for property management and commercial real estate. The next decisions in the chain: post-storm damage documentation and the portfolio roof program .
Next step · One roof
Put the roof on record.
A short call settles who is instructing us and what the document has to carry. It settles whether the thermal pass is in scope.
We reply within one business day.