Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Computation Programs Of The Astronomical Vessel Position, Chih-Li Chen, Tsung-Hsuan Hsieh

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

In open sea sailing, as opposed to sailing with satellite navigation systems, the astronomical vessel position (AVP) is not limited by military codes. If programs can be developed to solve the AVP directly, drawbacks of current methods for performing marine operations can be greatly improved. Complete AVP computations have two necessary points: compute the observed altitude and compute the AVP for two bodies. Thus, this paper utilizes Matlab® programming language to develop the observed altitude (ObsAltPro) and the AVP by using intercept method (IMPro-2) programs, respectively. Adopting the ObsAltPro can avoid the use of nautical almanacs and directly obtain the …