gen nav q

[G-SP0T]

if u fly a compass north, are u on a rhumb line or Great circle???

i think rhumb line as constant heading

[Longchop]

Subject has been done to death.....do a search and you'll find the answer!!

[G-SP0T]

why are some people like u, prat.

im asking a genuine question, whilst up too my neck in work.

this may also prove help full to other people who had not considered this question.

any 1 think im right

[Send Clowns]

Both (sort of) or neither. Assuming you mean true north rather than compass then you are following a meridian. If you did mean compass then you are following a magnetic meridian, or close to it, depending on deviation. That is certainly not a rhumb line and although the meridian itself is a great circle by JAA (inaccurate) approximations any compass deviation will take you off the great circle anyway.

By the strictest definition the true meridian is not a rhumb line (definition is a line which crosses each meridian at the same angle; a meridian does not cross any other meridian) but by the more usual definition of a constant-bearing line it is. However a meridian is also a 180° arc of a great circle, so flying ture north you are also following a great-circle path.

Does that help?

Send Clowns

Gen Nav Instructor,
BCFT