Greenwich meridian

[Wansworth]

Apparently somewhere else

 

[LittleSister]

Should we then change to the Paris Meridian which was one of the competing options?

 

[LittleSister]

What I need to know is does this mean I was less late for everything I have been late for in my life, or more?

 

[johnalison]

Should we then change to the Paris Meridian which was one of the competing options?

Wash your mouth out.

 

[Biggles Wader]

What I need to know is does this mean I was less late for everything I have been late for in my life, or more?

Is the Far East now not so Far or even Further?

 

[johnalison]

Is the Far East now not so Far or even Further?

Having now watched the entertaining video I can confirm that it is now massively nearer. Genghis Khan or whoever it is that wants to invade us will have a whole hundred metres less to get here.

 

[Wansworth]

What I need to know is does this mean I was less late for everything I have been late for in my life, or more?

Try that on the boss Monday morning……

 

[davidej]

I noticed this last time I sailed up the Thames.

 

[Sandy]

Apparently somewhere else

Just wait until you hear about magnetic north.

 

[Sybarite]

What I need to know is does this mean I was less late for everything I have been late for in my life, or more?

Running late is my main source of exercise.

 

[Poignard]

I wondered why I kept running aground...........

 

[LittleSister]

No one has questioned the presenters' assumption that the Earth is round.

Where is Viago these days?

 

[The Q]

It was in the right place when it was installed. Just because the Americans got it slightly wrong when they started GPS doesn't make wrong.

 

[capnsensible]

It's not every day you can get 'oblate spheroid' into a thread.....

 

[srm]

Does it really matter?
Hudson Bay Company ships would measure their longitude from the Kames of Hoy (big cliffs on the west of Orkney) when heading outbound for Canada.
I had a Norwegian chart (1:50,000) for an area up in the arctic printed using old plates with longitude scale measured from Oslo, and a second scale with long from Greenwich added later.
Measuring latitude from the equator makes sense but longitude is just east or west from wherever.

 

[capnsensible]

Depends I suppose if you wish to be understood by the rest of the world. Particularly if you need rescuing.

 

[davidej]

Is this the origin of charts being reissued updated to WGS84 ?

I still have some older ones in a cupboard.

 

[srm]

Is this the origin of charts being reissued updated to WGS84 ?

I still have some older ones in a cupboard.

Yes, each country had its own lat/long model that suited their land mapping. This caused interesting problems when they were projected out in to the North Sea and defining boundaries in the early days of oil/gas exploration. A new North Sea geodetic datum was agreed for rig positioning etc. Then GPS came along and that was the first international geodetic datum. The Russian sat nav system used their own datum, but also being based on the earth's gravity is very close to WGS84. If @AntarcticPilot is around he can probably go into further detail.

 

[Marsali_1]

It's not every day you can get 'oblate spheroid' into a thread.....

Is that something the missionaries use?

 

[justanothersailboat]

I've been to Greenwich fairly recently. They are pretty upfront about where different meridians were set over time (originally usually in line with the axis of the latest fixed-axis survey telescope used for a more accurate star map) and there is a sign indicating how far away in the park the GPS datum is. It's hardly Airy's fault that the methods the GPS designers had to determine the centre of the Earth weren't available to him.