A mast is a man-made support structure, commonly used on sailing ships as support for sails, or on land as radio masts and towers used to support telecommunication equipment such as radio antennas ("aerials" in the UK).
Most of the taller masts are located in the United States, where a prevalence of masts of around 2000 feet (609.6 m) in height is the result of special rules in that country limiting structures and objects taller than 2000 feet.
The Petronius Compliant Tower is an oil platform standing 2100 ft or 640 m (to the top of the spire) and is the tallest non-guyed structure in existence but is mostly underwater.
There is often crossover in term usage as some skyscraper use the tower term, some towers use the mast term, and ironically 'skyscraper' has some word heritage from references to high sailboat masts.
Top masts are ranked by pinnacle height; in the case of a tie, the older structure is ranked as higher.
Once again, the list includes guyed masts, almost exclusively radio masts, though a few for other purposes are present (for example, the BREN-Tower.) Self-supporting masts are covered as towers under the List of towers, and the borderline cases are mentioned separately (hybrid designs, under water, etc.) elsewhere on this page.
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