Next message: Bruce Stark: "Re: Green Flash and Longitude"
Andrew Young then asks:
"Oh? Care to cite a reference? Where did this idea come from? Has anyone
out
there ever heard of this before? Let's hear when some of those 'many
occasions' actually occurred! "
Good questions. So has anyone on Navigation-L ever heard of this? I
haven't.
I can't think of any way to make sense of the idea (green flash for
longitude??), but that doesn't mean no one ever suggested it, of course.
-FER
42.0N 87.7W, or 41.4N 72.1W.
Interesting to say the least. But I don't think so. Not even a little bit.
In all my time at sea I can count the times I've witnessed the Green Flash
on one hand. Not counting the thumb and index finger.
I was always told of this event by more senior personnel. Years went by with
out my seeing it. I considered it as something like an initiation right much
like crossing the Equator or being sent in search of some "prop wash" until
the senior members of the crew deemed a person "qualified". Then one evening
while on watch I too saw it. But did I really? After all those years of
being told it happens and never witnessing it did I want it to happen so
much that my mind made it happen? It wasn't until years later I saw it
happen again and knew it to be a true event.
Does that have something to do with times of watchstanding? Perhaps I missed
a couple of times more while not on watch during the time when the
phenomenon happens.
Conditions, both atmospheric and the observer's angle, have to be just
perfect at the time of setting for this event to even be witnessed. When it
does happen it is quickly over. A few seconds of time and it's gone. The
Sun's upper limb is already kissing or slightly below the horizon when this
event does happen.
I just can't imagine how it can be done as stated. There are easier ways to
accomplish the same thing.
