How To Navigate Using the Stars

One of the most useful skills in early times was to be able to navigate using the stars. With this ability, sailors and explorers were able to venture through their lands and even discover new ones. Here's a little on how they did it.

[jerryadams]

It's been 45 years since I was a Navy navigator, ships and aircraft. This video was a nostalgic reminder of those days. Thank you.

[TheEricZ]

They skipped this lesson in school, for the last 200 years.

[meks]

Its a real crime, that your channel only gets so little attention. this video was absolutely amazing!

[milky_wayan]

binge watching a youtube channel has never been so rewarding

[ThatJapaneseManYuta]

This is really interesting. I learned a lot from this video.

[GoSlash]

Another trick: The elevation to Polaris is the same as your latitude. Flat Earthers hate that fact because it proves that the Earth is a sphere.

[SoaringSuccubus]

Man this is amazing. To think, every human that ever existed, looked up towards the sky and saw in awe the exact same thing we do. And that stars have never failed to inspire us. From stargazing to navigating unknown seas during the night, timelessly. What a thought!

The music also fits perfectly.

[naomielfalan]

I’m boutta get me and the homies lost in the ocean talkin bout “i know how to read the stars we don’t need no map”

[Oceansta]

If my brain wasn't dead from binge-watching YouTube videos all day, I might just be able to remember all this and actually use it some day.

[jaylol]

Another cool trick I learned in astronomy class that works in the northern hemisphere: if you find Polaris, take your outstretched fists, and line the bottom of one fist up with the horizon, then stack your fists one on top of each other until you reach Polaris. Each stack = 10 degrees north latitude, so this allows you to roughly gauge how far north of the equator you are. Since you'll also know the directions, this can get you a pretty good gauge of your actual global position relative to the equator. In case, you know, you didn't realize already you were in Canada or something.

[mysteriousDSF]

The information in the video proves that it is IMPOSSIBLE that people on Earth EVER thought the Earth was flat. Earth being a globe is a basic primordial fact.

[jainysail]

Imagine, somewhere in the milky way, an intelligence life using the sun for directional navigation.

[joelfernandes]

Instructions unclear, got morooned on an Island.

[wes]

I was an Air Force RC-135 navigator in the 80-90s. We practiced celestial and grid navigation on each training flights and used it for real-world missions over water or polar regions. It worked well if the plane was stable and out of the clouds. Calculating, shooting, and plotting cell LOPs every 20 minutes for 10 hours made for a long day. They stopped teaching it around 2001. Thanks for sharing.

[adrianunicycleadventures]

I became curious about this subject when I was 10, I used to get an sky view app in my mother's smartphone, a telescope, binoculars and go outside specially in the summer nights to see the international space station or what ever I could see.
They should teach this on schools, it's not hard and useful for fun/survival situations.

[olgierdvoneverec]

amazingly well explained, it's a crime to see so few subscribers for this channel, hopefully that will change soon.

[jakkuwolfinsomnia]

I always found it impressive that people could actually navigate like this

[kwekumruth]

Wow I've been looking for this information for years thank you so much! How is the sextant used ?

[fklucid]

This is the best star navigation video I've found. So much detail and fun to watch! The background music was great!

[alcatrazeleochestra]

A very nice tutorial. last time, I'm 2nd officer on a merchant ship. I always study
through books about celestial navigation. and with these tutorials, it's very used
to me.