Longest Straight Line Paths on Water or Land on the Earth (2018)

ventana•about 3 hours ago

The paper is basically like this (spoiler alert):

“Some random user on Reddit posted a picture claiming that this is the longest straight line path on water possible on the Earth. We implemented a smart algorithm to solve this problem, found the elevation data, ran our algorithm... yes, that random user was right. Also, here's the longest path on land.”

Thanks, I really enjoyed reading it, even though I hoped that they would disprove the original claim!

Edit: here are the gcmap links to the two paths: sea [1], land [2].

[1]: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=25%B017%27N+66%B040%27E-58%B037...

[2]: http://www.gcmap.com/mapui?P=24%B033%27N+118%B038%27E-37%B02...

cubefox•19 minutes ago

They only identify the Reddit user as "kepleronlyknows", but in the Reddit thread [1] he links to his video visualization [2], where his user name is Patrick Anderson.

Before he made the video visualization using Google Earth, he actually went to the library and used a string on a real globe. [3]

1: https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/15mwai/the_longest...

2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpQwuGueeoA

3: https://imgur.com/a/great-circle-2hYFM

comrade1234•about 1 hour ago

I opened Apple Maps in globe mode and I still have trouble visualizing the water path.

pdpi•about 1 hour ago

Does it help to point out that the water path looks suspiciously like the day/night line on a map?

Like this: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/5477/

OscarCunningham•about 2 hours ago

There's a longer land path that starts in or near Senegal and ends in China. But they miss it because it goes near the Dead Sea, and they treat anything below sea level as water.

cubefox•17 minutes ago

That would an interesting finding!

shrx•about 2 hours ago

> Figure 9: Longest Drivable Straight Line Path on Earth.

Walkable, maybe, but definitely not drivable (it crosses directly over the Alps, for example).

pbhjpbhj•about 2 hours ago

There might be icebergs or sandbars or rocks or volcanic activity or wars blocking the sailing route too. They seem like equivalents.

The longest mettled straight route with minimal deviation would also be an interesting exercise.

kakacik•about 2 hours ago

Extremely highly inprobable vs 100% there and directly impassable unless walking & doing some proper alpinism is hardly equivalent

1313ed01•about 1 hour ago

But what would flat-earthers consider the longest possible paths to be? Not the ones shown in the article, presumably?

mrgriscom•about 2 hours ago

I made a "first person" perspective rendering of this: https://mrgris.com/img/landfall/longest.png

dr_dshiv•about 2 hours ago

If it is undrivable in a straight line, why does that count? I’d assume the longest you could drive in a perfectly straight line would either be the longest straight highway or some drivable desert.

paufernandez•about 2 hours ago

Nerd sniping at its best... ;)

metalman•about 1 hour ago

it would be interesting if it was a list of actual journeys with the sub lists of deviations required. a special club for the brutaly determined and persistant the "strait liners" things like having to beg, bluff, bribe, your way through someones house

shrx•about 1 hour ago

Wikipedia has an article listing some of the notable (walking) straight line missions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straight_line_mission

edit: and the article already notes this longest possible path from Portugal to China, citing a 2023 article: https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/these-are-the-worlds-longe...

Longest Straight Line Paths on Water or Land on the Earth (2018)

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