Daily Archives: 20-December-2017

Earth's Curvature and Battleship Gunnery

I must admit that I am a bit of a battleship junkie. I have been reading some old US Navy manuals on battleship fire control, which discuss the various effects that must be corrected for to ensure accurate fire (Figure 1). In this post, I want to examine how the curvature of the Earth affected the gunnery direction. Curvature corrections are only needed for very long-range artillery. Continue reading

Posted in Ballistics, Naval History | 102 Comments