15 GREAT CIRCLE SAILING
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• On a Mercator chart great-circle tracks bow toward the nearest pole.
• At each meridian they have a greater latitude than the rhumb line.
• The difference in distance between a great-circle track and a rhumb line is:
Greatest at high latitudes.
Least for tracks near the equator where the meridians are nearly
parallel.
Greater for east-west courses than north-south courses.
• Reach a maximum latitude at the apex.
• Great circles plot as straight lines on gnomonic charts.
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