Check this out: a flight simulator using Google maps!
You can even trick it into starting at your house, or anyplace where you have the latitude and longitude. The Little Astronomer and I flew a plane from our house to the Golden Gate Bridge. Top speed is like 40 mph, so it takes a while to actually get anywhere. But it’s fun, and I can see this being able to be expanded to do lots of other fun things, too.
Tip o’ the aviator goggles to Angela Gunn, who is "endlessly fond" of me.
If you went to BadAstronomy.com and found yourself here, never fear: the BA Blog has moved to its new home at Discover Blogs. The original BA site (with the Moon Hoax debunking and all that) is still online, too.
Phil Plait, the creator of Bad Astronomy, is an astronomer, lecturer, and author. After ten years working on Hubble Space Telescope and six more working on astronomy education, he struck out on his own as a writer. He has written two books, dozens of magazine articles, and 12 bazillion blog articles. He is a skeptic, and fights misuses of science as well as praising the wonder of real science.
Contact me: The Bad Astronomer "at" gmail "dot" com
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August 28th, 2006 at 1:05 pm
That’s cool!
I also play with Google Earth as an improvised flight & orbital sim. I just tilt the globe over so I’m flying horizontally. With the ‘terrian’ function turned on, I even get to negotiate real mountain peaks.
I can also use it as an orbit sim. I just put myself at a typical satellite altitude, give Earth a shove with my mouse, and I just glide inertially about the globe.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:42 pm
Great! I just crashed a plane on Mars.
It would’ve been even better with sound.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:49 pm
Yeah, I tried to land on the Sea of Tranquillity, but just crashed. Oh well, I suppose someday my bones will be discovered by astronauts traipsing around up there.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:59 pm
That. Is. Awesome!!
August 28th, 2006 at 2:05 pm
I crashed into the White House front lawn
August 28th, 2006 at 3:41 pm
Great, now the CIA/NSA/HLS will be monitoring this blog.
August 28th, 2006 at 11:11 pm
i couldn’t do a barrol roll.
August 29th, 2006 at 1:07 am
Now that is pretty cool! They could have made the airplane look more realistic… but overall, that was FUN!
August 29th, 2006 at 1:55 am
ToSeeked in the [url=http://www.bautforum.com/showthread.php?t=45464]forum[/url] attached to this blog
August 29th, 2006 at 4:43 am
Well, I crashed on the moon, now all I need is to elicit some major sympathy and get rescued by a mass retrival effort. Please hurry. I’m running low on air,,,
GAry 7
September 1st, 2006 at 10:52 am
I’m having trouble trying to stop this thing. I can’t even get it to stall. And landing is a big problem. I’ve only crashed once and that was into the sea. Fortunately the water-wings worked and the sharks were otherwise engaged. I love the way it levels off at a certain maximum height, and at slow speed it turns in its own length.
The only other trouble is when I fly to the outskirts of the city, it runs out of terrain, or is that dense fog? Or low cloud? Or snow?
Nevertheless it’s a great little diversion, so maybe another aircraft for friendly combat, or dogfights or even races. On line would be even better. Thanks in anticipation.
Ivan.