I know that by "easternmost" and "westernmost," you (both Roger and Mike) are
referring to the most highly numbered east and west longitudes, but that is an
extremely arbitrary and unnatural use of these terms.
Wake up! The world is round, and its hemispheres join seamlessly! (I do not
seriously doubt that you already know these facts.) Do you consider an Aleutian
island that lies a few miles WEST of the 180th meridian to be EAST of another
Aleutian Island that lies EAST of the same meridian. I don't! When hunting the
easternmost and westernmost points in the USA, Russia, or whatever place, I'd
measure from the center of that place. I'd only measure from Greenwich if I
were hunting the extreme points of Greenwich.
Lowell G. McManus
Leesville, Louisiana, USA
----- Original Message -----
From: "aletheiak" <aletheiak@...>
To: <BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, February 10, 2005 9:51 AM
Subject: [BoundaryPoint] Re: Russia Extremes (and relation to 180 Meridien)
the map at the end of this official but as yet unratified treaty
http://russia.shaps.hawaii.edu/fp/us/agree.html
gives west longitude 168deg 58min 37sec as wet rue
aka the easternmost extremity of russian territorial waters
but it is based on a fully ratified 1867 treaty
so i presume it is correct & effective
that is absolute rue too
& dry rue
aka the easternmost point of dry land in russia
is about 1500 meters west of that
on the easternmost point of big diomede island
but i could only approximate the longitude for that
if you still want it anyway
& please see 1 insert below
--- In BoundaryPoint@yahoogroups.com, "Roger_Rowlett"
<roger.rowlett@a...> wrote:
>
> I'm a lurker in this group.
>
> But I was curious if anybody has the exact coordinates for the
> geographic extremes for Russia since it straddles the 180
Meridien.
>
> The United States has "through the looking glass" extremes
because
> the Aleutians in Alaska straddle the Meridien (in which Alaska
has
> the North, East and West geographic extremes for the U.S.)
>
>
> West Point on Amatignak Island at 179° 06' 31" west is
considered
> the extreme west point of the U.S.
>
> Pochnoi Point on Semisopochnoi Island has coordinates of
179° 46'
> East is only 70 miles WEST of Amatignak but it gets the East
> designation.
again a distinction could be made between wet & dry
the easternmost & westernmost points of the usa actually
converge further
if you mean to include the american territorial waters
&or the american eezs
technically the easternmost & westernmost points of the usa are
both at 180 longitude
just like the dry east & west russia extremes you mention below
> And just to make things interesting the Aleutians continue
another
> 300 miles WEST to Cape Wrangell on Attu Island at 172° 54'
East
> Even though Attu Island is as far as you can go from right to left
> on a map for both Alaska and the U.S. it doesn't count as any
> extreme by our traditional ways of determining this.
>
> Presumably Russia would have similar looking glass
coordinates
> although perhaps not quite so dramatic since the 180
meridien
> crosses a big swath of Siberia (so the east/west Russia
extremes
> would be either side of it for its length). In most maps you
> usually don't see this as they show the manually adjusted zig
> zagging dateline.
>
> I was just curious to find the official coordinates on how far
> Russia extends into the Western Hemisphere.
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