Greetings fellow dialists, Nowadays, oil exploration is conducted within government concessions. These are areas defined by a succession of points, often at sea, to form a closed box. All you do is join the points on a chart and you have your concession plotted. But how do you join the points? Do you use loxodromes (rhumb lines) or arcs of great circles? This becomes important in high latitudes, in wide areas or where an oilfield crosses the territorial limits of two countries. I am told that a few tens of metres can sometimes be highly significant in the last case.
How best to show the deviation between a great circle and a rhumb line at various points along their courses? I know of computer programmes that give initial course and distance for great circles. But what is needed is a graphical programme to plot the two methods on a computer screen with the ability to give the departure of one line from the other at any point. Can anyone make a suggestion, please? Frank 55N 1W P.S. I'm not an oil man, merely a simple dialist. -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.5.476 / Virus Database: 269.10.6/902 - Release Date: 15/07/2007 14:21 --------------------------------------------------- https://lists.uni-koeln.de/mailman/listinfo/sundial
