I’m just back from giving a short talk at the Royal Institute of Navigation‘s Land Conference at the National Physical Laboratory.
I learnt plenty from the other speakers and chats during the breaks. One little gem: the Apollo program nearly lost two astronauts, literally. They were roaming the lunar surface and became temporarily unaware where ‘home’ was. Without a map, compass, GPS or any other instrument there were some tense moments before they found their way back successfully. Definitely an opportunity for some natural navigation training in this niche market, as I was not too shy to point out to the assembled!
Something that makes a walk on the moon more challenging than on earth is that the moon has a much smaller radius and therefore has a more dramatically curved surface, the result being you cannot see nearly as far on the moon as you can on…
