this post was submitted on 20 Aug 2024
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No, that's not Earth's great circle, you'll be turning slightly. It only seems straight on most map projections because they want latitudes to be horizontal.
Well, I stand corrected. I guess we'll need to wait for the ice on the North pole to melt before we can make a more stupid voyage.
It would, however, seem like a straight line to whoever was on the boat, because they'd be traveling due west the whole time, and the course corrections they'd have to make to keep going west would look the same as course corrections needed to account for wind, ocean currents, etc.