On Mon, 3 Aug 1998, Tony Moss wrote: > > The latest question is "How far away is the sea horizon?"
Like most sundial questions this is also of imporance in navigation. How far away the horizon is at sea depends, of course, on how far above sea leval you are. If you are treading water with your eyes at seal leval your horizon will be very near your face. If you stand in the lifeboat with your eyes 6 feet above sea level the horizon is 3 miles out. Take the distance in feet from the sea surface to your eye level, multiply by 3/2 and then take the square root. This is approximately the distance in miles to the horizon. (I assume they mean statute miles--this is boiled down from Science Digest Feb 1984 p 34)
