Shipwrecked
Criminal
00:00
"Dead reckoning" and the perils of miscalculated longitude
In their quest for accurate navigation, sailors in the past could determine latitude by reading the stars, but measuring longitude required a reliable clock that didn't exist. Captain Chief, relying on dead reckoning (informed guesswork), sets out to reach a rendezvous point in Chile, but their longitude calculations were way off, leading them dangerously close to shore. With no quick reversal options, turning the ship around could take as long as an hour due to the complexities of maneuvering sails and mast climbing.
Transcript
Play full episode
