In article 16d6f1db-a6c2-4d8b-bc2e-99639e3ef851
@googlegroups.com, says...

On Friday, 15 December 2017 11:12:11 UTC, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
On 15/12/17 10:24, whisky-dave wrote:
On 07/12/2017 10:53, whisky-dave wrote:

Friend flew from gatwick to cacun on tuesday explan why they didn't just fly directly across the ocean


Great circle

Largely it takes you over greenland labrador and down the E coast of the USA

Why doesn't it just go across directly then that would be a shorter distance less fuel quicker flight ?

It could go across cornwall but it doesn't it heads North to greenland.


Because, as you've already been told, it flies the Great
Circle route. You are used to flat maps that are centred at
a point on the equator but the earth isn't flat.

A Geat Circle map shows the earth as viewed fom a apecific
poin on the globe. If you draw a straight line - ie: the
shortest route - on a Great Circle map you will find that is
doesn't follow what appears to be (but isn'!) the most
direct route on a 'normal' map.

This is a Great Circle map:

http://www.mapability.com/ei8ic/maps/gcm-9k1.gif

It is actually centred on a point in County Leitrim, Ulster
but is close enough to Gatwick, at this scale, to illustrate
the point. Draw a straight line on the map from Gatwick to
Cacun and see where it goes ...

--

Terry

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