Hacker News
Favorites
Setup
☰
Home
Favorites
Setup
Comment by comrade1234 |
original
|
Longest Straight Line Paths on Water or Land on the Earth (2018)
[−]
comrade1234
· 2026-08-30 Sun 10:12 UTC ·
link
fave
I opened Apple Maps in globe mode and I still have trouble visualizing the water path.
[−]
pdpi
· 2026-08-30 Sun 10:38 UTC ·
link
fave
Does it help to point out that the water path looks suspiciously like the day/night line on a map?
Like this:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5477/
[−]
newtwentysix
· 2026-08-30 Sun 12:28 UTC ·
link
fave
yes!! why is that ? :)
[−]
yorwba
· 2026-08-30 Sun 13:01 UTC ·
link
fave
The day/light line is a great circle. The "straight line paths" are great-circle segments.
[−]
srean
· 2026-08-30 Sun 12:44 UTC ·
link
fave
It's going South and then trying to close the loop from behind. It gets interrupted by land before the loop closes.
Hope it makes sense.
[−]
turbocon
· 2026-08-30 Sun 12:53 UTC ·
link
fave
Open the linked paper and scroll down, they have images of the path on a globe as well as the flat map view.
Like this: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5477/
Hope it makes sense.