How far can you sail in a straight line without hitting land? The answer appears to be an almost 20,000 mile voyage from Pakistan to the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia. The red line on the map, above, shows the voyage.
OK, so the red line looks anything but straight. Nevertheless, it is a straight line as projected on a flat map. The earth is anything but flat. Check out the video below to see the line projected on a spherical earth. What we are seeing is a great circle route between Pakistan to the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia, which happens to stay clear of land. A great circle is an arc representing the shortest distance between two points anywhere on the Earth’s surface. Thanks to Patrick Anderson for uploading the video.
A straight line without hitting land from Pakistan to Russia
I found a route that is over 2000 miles longer than this.
http://youtu.be/S5HgaVZwvCM
19914 is the longest great circle that I could find. Doesn’t hit any land between ends. I verified using 2 identical circles in GE Pro each with a radius of 6225.25 miles with centers at opposite points on the globe.
Here’s my original solution, which was only 19820 miles.
https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/gec-fun-games/WZ3P_IvO0pc
Improved with better tools now, although I didn’t make a youtube video of it.
Here are the endpoints of the new, verified line.
Karachi end:
25d 20′ 41″ N
66d 33′ 55″ E
Kamchatka end:
59d 45′ 00″ N
163d 22′ 25″ E
Some points in between:
54d 10′ 20.62″ S
3d 4′ 12.91″ E
This is about 17 miles NW of Bouvet Island
28d 21′ 5.77″ S
111d 23′ 17.18″ W
This is about 143 miles SW of Easter Island