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Optimum Flight Paths

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 January 2010

Extract

A condensed version of a paper presented to the Centre Beige de Navigation, Brussels, 9 January 1950.

The fact that the most expeditious route between two points on the Earth's surface is not necessarily a great circle is no new discovery. In the days of sailing ships courses were set to take maximum advantage of the wind; the trade winds were so called because they made the voyages of the trading ships possible. To a large extent they dictated the sea lanes and it was not until the arrival of the steamship that more direct routes across the oceans could be followed.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Navigation 1951

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References

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