🔍 Key Concepts

• Great circle vs. rhumb line behavior on gnomonic vs. Mercator charts • Location and meaning of a vertex on a great-circle track in the Northern Hemisphere • Standard method of measuring distance along a great-circle track for voyage planning

💭 Think About

• First, picture the general direction of travel from the departure to the way‑point: in which compass quadrants will your great‑circle courses likely fall? • Think about how a great‑circle track appears on a gnomonic chart compared with how that same track appears on a Mercator chart between Greenland/Cape Farwell and the Western North Atlantic. • Ask yourself where the vertex of this great circle would lie (in terms of latitude and relative longitude), and whether your given positions are east or west of that point.

✅ Before You Answer

• Verify how distance along a great-circle track is normally computed in ocean navigation references—do you use mid‑track latitude or something else? • On a Mercator projection, determine whether a great‑circle track between these points would bow toward or away from Cape Farwell (Kap Farvel). • Confirm from your plotted points whether you are sailing toward or away from the vertex, and thus whether you are east or west of it in the Northern Hemisphere.