John McGrandle, an Ordnance Survey digital camera operator on one of the agency's planes

Britain’s national mapping agency has set up its aerial photography unit at a new site.

Ordnance Survey’s flying unit, which produces the photographs from which maps are produced, will be based at East Midlands Airport for the next three years.

OS will use the base for its flights recording high-resolution images for its cartography, and flights will be made from the airport near Derby across the whole of Britain, from the Highlands of Scotland to England’s south coast.

The aerial imagery captured by the agency’s two aircraft will be used to update the master map of the country, which records more than 5,000 changes each day.

The two planes, a Cessna 402 and Cessna 404, carry cameras which record change at a highly detailed level and are among the highest resolution in the country recording 196 megapixels on each image.

Over the course of the 2011 flying season, the cameras captured more than 51,000 useable frames including those covering all the Olympic sites and 140 other target areas.

The unit was previously housed at Blackpool International Airport and before that used various bases across the country.

Tony Mabey, head of remote sensing at Ordnance Survey, said: “We are delighted to be making use of the first-class facilities which East Midlands Airport has to offer.

“We have moved to make commercial and operational efficiencies connected to the current contract with the aircraft service provider, who has recently opened a new purpose-built hanger at East Midlands Airport.

“As a world-class mapping agency, it is important for us to be making the most of the technology and the opportunities to update our mapping as cost effectively and efficiently as we can.”

• grough is a commercial partner of Ordnance Survey in its grough route mapping and route-planning system.