What Is Latitude?

What's the scale of longitude and latitude?

• Like, what's the distance between 50 and 51 looking at longitude and latitude? I'm doing a project where my we have to put an island somewhere on a map, including the longitude and latitude. we also have to provide the opproximate size. So if my island was going from about 17n to 60w to 16n, 57w. is that really big or really small? how many mines/kilometers long is it?

• Answer:

  the earth's slightly ellipsoid shape) from 68.703 miles (110.567 km) at the equator to 69.407 (111.699 km) at the poles. This is convenient because each minute (1/60th of a degree) is approximately one mile. A degree of longitude is widest at the equator at 69.172 miles (111.321) and gradually shrinks to zero at the poles. At 40° north or south the distance between a degree of longitude is 53 miles (85 km). ------------- ==> At 40° north or south the distance between a degree of longitude is 53 miles (85 km). ==> Between 60° west and 57° west latitude, your mythical island would be 3 * 69 = 207 miles in length. =========== I hope this is helpful.