Posted on 07/28/2009 9:05:44 AM PDT by Wardenclyffe
Back when GPS was first coming in (shoot, back when VOR was coming in!) we were always told to have a REAL chart, our parallel rulers, and circular sliderule/Jep E6B handy. I had a complete electrical system failure in a Cessna 150 one time on a cross-country, and I was VERY glad that I had kept track of my position on my chart (when you're buzzing along at a blazing 94 knots indicated, what else is there to do other than keep a sharp lookout for other traffic?)
Story is told about a sailor in the Atlantic Race for Cruisers with more money than sense -- programmed BOTH his GPSs with a speed of 600 kts instead of 6 kts. During the race, he radioed in a panic because the GPS showed him somewhere off the coast of Japan - and he had no idea how to navigate the old-fashioned way . . . .
Some people shouldn't be allowed outside without supervision.
“I knew I should have taken that left turn at Albuquerque.”
Don't care what anybody says - Studebakers are COOL.
This is the kind of thing that really scares me about technology. People become so addicted to it they aren’t paying attention, they think tech’s gonna save the world, they don’t pay attention to the fact that most of this stuff was made by guys with social disorders that consider a bag of Doritos a meal (including me, I’m in QA). We’re not going to save you people, we’re mistake prone, sleep deprived and often times kind of burned out, if you’re trying to get to an island and your GPS never steers you to a bridge the toy is wrong pull over and ask directions the old fashioned way.
While vacationing in Ireland last May, my wife and ran into some fellow Americans at a B&B. They asked us how we got around. We have a gps but left it at home choosing to use a variety of maps. We asked them how they got around and what maps they used. They replied that they had no maps and relied totally on their gps. It led them down some very narrow Irish roads where only some very brave sheep trod. Finally they switched the thingey so that they took main roads. But I can’t imagine traveling around my own state much less a foreign country without maps.
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