Well, that plus the fact that most people hate math ;-)<br><br>I agree, it would be very hard to get so badly lost on foot that you didn't know your position within, say, 20 miles. I first got interested in survival because I have a small aircraft Private Pilot's license (and I got roped into giving a talk on Wilderness Survival to a group of pilots :-) It wouldn't take much to end up 50 or more miles off course. (I read an article once about a RCAF aircrew in the 1950's who took off on a routine flight from Resolute Bay to Churchill, Manitoba. They ended up making an emergency landing in Point Barrow, Alaska - only 1654 nautical miles off course. Now that takes real navigational ingenuity. ;-)<br><br>(To put this in perspective, the main runway at Resolute Bay pointed almost directly at Churchill. All they had to do was take off, fly straight until they picked up the Churchill beacon, home in on it, and land.) The navigator apparently got Grid North and True North confused. On the Arctic charts he was using, Grid North was actually almost due East. :-0 Hence the 90 degree turn to starboard that sent them out over the Arctic Ocean.<br><br>I love this stuff :-}
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"The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled."
-Plutarch