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Posidonius calculated the Earth's circumference by reference to the position of the star Canopus.As explained by Cleomedes, Posidonius observed Canopus on but never above the horizon at Rhodes, while at Alexandria he saw it ascend as far as 7 + 1 ⁄ 2 degrees above the horizon (the meridian arc between the latitude of the two locales is actually 5 degrees 14 minutes).
With the circumference of the Earth being approximately 40,000 km (24,855 mi), the maximum distance that can be displayed on an azimuthal equidistant projection map is half the circumference, or about 20,000 km (12,427 mi). For distances less than 10,000 km (6,214 mi) distortions are minimal.
Explain how shadow angle maps to angle around Earth centre. 19:30, 1 November 2016: 512 × 341 (49 KB) Cmglee: Use satellite photo instead of topo map, and add protractor. 00:34, 1 November 2016: 512 × 341 (48 KB) Cmglee: Outline shapes to work around thumbnail rendering bug losing gradient. 00:26, 1 November 2016: 512 × 341 (49 KB) Cmglee
A circle of latitude or line of latitude on Earth is an abstract east–west small circle connecting all locations around Earth (ignoring elevation) at a given latitude coordinate line. Circles of latitude are often called parallels because they are parallel to each other; that is, planes that contain any of these circles never intersect each ...
Later arc measurements aimed at determining the flattening of the Earth ellipsoid by measuring at different geographic latitudes. The first of these was the French Geodesic Mission , commissioned by the French Academy of Sciences in 1735–1738, involving measurement expeditions to Lapland ( Maupertuis et al.) and Peru ( Pierre Bouguer et al.).
The angular velocity of the Earth is defined to be ω = 72.921 15 × 10 −6 rad/s. [ 11 ] This leads to several computed parameters such as the polar semi-minor axis b which equals a × (1 − f ) = 6 356 752 .3142 m , and the first eccentricity squared, e 2 = 6.694 379 990 14 × 10 −3 .
The 45th parallel north is often called the halfway point between the equator and the North Pole, but the true halfway point is 16.0 km (9.9 mi) north of it (approximately between 45°08'36" and 45°08'37") because Earth is an oblate spheroid; that is, it bulges at the equator and is flattened at the poles.
Geodetic latitude and geocentric latitude have different definitions. Geodetic latitude is defined as the angle between the equatorial plane and the surface normal at a point on the ellipsoid, whereas geocentric latitude is defined as the angle between the equatorial plane and a radial line connecting the centre of the ellipsoid to a point on the surface (see figure).