Minute and second of arc arcsecond on a 10 m class telescope. Minutes (′) and seconds (″) of arc are also used in cartography and navigation. At sea level one minute of arc along the equator or a meridian (indeed, any great circle) equals exactly one geographical mile along the Earth's equator or approximately one nautical mile (1852 meters, or ≈1.15078 statute miles). A second of arc, one sixtieth of this amount, is roughly 30 meters or 100 feet. The exact distance varies along meridian arcs because the figure of the Earth is slightly oblate (bulges a third of a percent at the equator). Positions
Lambert cylindrical equal-area projection as, "Notes and Comments on the Composition of Terrestrial and Celestial Maps". Lambert's projection is the basis for the cylindrical equal-area projection family. Lambert chose the equator as the parallel of no distortion. By multiplying the projection's height by some factor and dividing the width by the same factor, the regions of no distortion can be moved to any desired pair of parallels north and south of the equator. These variations, particularly the Gall–Peters projection, are more commonly encountered in maps than Lambert’s original projection due to their lower distortion overall. where "φ" is the latitude, "λ" is the longitude