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Latitude From Two Star Altitudes Only
From: David Pike
Date: 2026 Apr 3, 13:30 -0700
From: David Pike
Date: 2026 Apr 3, 13:30 -0700
LATITUDE FROM TWO STAR ALTITUDES ONLY
Q. Two observers at the same location shoot two stars simultaneously. Using the information below, calculate their latitude.
Given:
Star Declination SHA Ho
Pollux 27°57.8’N 243°16.0’ 62°54.4’
Capella 46°01.6’N 280°20.6’ 57°12.0’
Polaris is visible and the bearing of Pollux from Capella is greater than 90 degrees.
I’ll post my solution on Monday, by which time I should have rubbed out all my crossed out dead ends.
Using trig fns to five places got me back to within 4' of arc of where I started from.
DaveP
