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The Sextant reading is known as the 'Sextant Altitude'. This is corrected by use of tables to a 'True Altitude'. The actual declination and hour angle of the celestial body are found from astronomical tables for the time of the measurement and together with the 'True Altitude' are put into a formula with the assumed latitude.
A diagram of a typical nautical sextant, a tool used in celestial navigation to measure the angle between two objects viewed by means of its optical sight. Celestial navigation, also known as astronavigation, is the practice of position fixing using stars and other celestial bodies that enables a navigator to accurately determine their actual current physical position in space or on the ...
Sextant. A sextant is a doubly reflecting navigation instrument that measures the angular distance between two visible objects. The primary use of a sextant is to measure the angle between an astronomical object and the horizon for the purposes of celestial navigation . The estimation of this angle, the altitude, is known as sighting or ...
Voilà, the new version of the sextant is ready. The animation is now smoother and a bit simplified. I decided to include the light rays only at the begining and at the end, otherwise the image would be too cluttered. But the sextant is a working replica, i.e., the angles and reflections are all correct. - Alvesgaspar 21:34, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
Kamal (navigation) A simple wooden kamal. A kamal, often called simply khashaba (wood in Arabic), [1] is a celestial navigation device that determines latitude. The invention of the kamal allowed for the earliest known latitude sailing, [2] and was thus the earliest step towards the use of quantitative methods in navigation. [3]
The latitude of the North Pole is 90° N, and the latitude of the South Pole is 90° S. [9] Mariners calculated latitude in the Northern Hemisphere by sighting the pole star with a sextant and using sight reduction tables to correct for height of eye and atmospheric refraction. The height of Polaris in degrees above the horizon is the latitude ...
A modern astrolabe made in Tabriz, Iran in 2013. An astrolabe ( Greek: ἀστρολάβος astrolábos, 'star-taker'; Arabic: ٱلأَسْطُرلاب al-Asṭurlāb; Persian: ستارهیاب Setāreyāb) is an astronomical instrument dating to ancient times. It serves as a star chart and physical model of visible heavenly bodies.
Sight reduction. In astronavigation, sight reduction is the process of deriving from a sight (in celestial navigation usually obtained using a sextant) the information needed for establishing a line of position, generally by intercept method . Sight is defined as the observation of the altitude, and sometimes also the azimuth, of a celestial ...