(11-29-2020, 07:45 PM)F2d5thCav Wrote: I recall getting instruction in land navigation from a Special Forces NCO.
He was discussing the difference between true north and magnetic north. Then, he sort of offhand mentioned that when one gets north far enough, the compass no longer points at true north.
Must of been kinda cold, wherever that was.
Cheers
There are only a couple of places on Earth's surface where a compass points to geographic or "true" north. For everywhere else, there is a declination, an angle formed between geographic and magnetic north, hence the declination diagrams found at the bottom of topo maps.
To make it more interesting, the magnetic north pole "wanders", so any declination diagram is only good for about 10 years or so.
Since records started being kept in 1590, the magnetic pole simply meandered around in the northern parts of Hudson's Bay, but around 2000, it started galloping and accelerating straight towards Russia, and across the geographic north pole. In 2009 or 2010, I created a video of it by taking screengrabs out of Google Earth with it's position plotted from 1590 to that date to demonstrate that, and then stringing them together as frames of a video. It was astounding when visualized that way, but I've not done it since, so I don't know if it's still about to become Russian territory or not nowadays.
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Diogenes was eating bread and lentils for supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king.
Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’
Said Aristippus, ‘If you would learn to be subservient to the king you would not have to live on lentils.’ Said Diogenes, ‘Learn to live on lentils and you will not have to be subservient to the king.’