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Numerical Adaptations of Captain Sumner's 1837 journey: a context for teaching celestial navigation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 April 2022

Tom Bensky
Tom Bensky*
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, California 93407, USA
*
E-mail: tbensky@calpoly.edu
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Abstract

In an effort to add context to a classroom lesson on celestial navigation, we present a numerical adaptation of Captain T.H. Sumner's 1837 journey into St. George's Channel. The adaptation is programmed into a ‘live’ web-based map. This allows for a flexible and highly visual presentation that highlights two important topics in celestial navigation: the origin of the line of position and the scale of maps. Considerations driving the numerical adaptation are discussed, as is as an overview of a classroom lesson we have been using.

Keywords

nauticalnavigationnatural navigationoptimisationhistory
Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Navigation , Volume 75 , Issue 3 , May 2022 , pp. 614 - 624
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Royal Institute of Navigation

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