Crop Duster Animation
In October 2016 I was contacted by Lem Shattuck, a professional agricultural aviator, who asked me if it would be possible to create an animation in Google Earth of the path followed by a crop-duster aeroplane using GPS data recorded in-flight. The animation would be used in evidence in a trial in which he had been recruited as an expert witness. I was confident that the answer was ‘yes’ but it took several months of exchanging information with Lem to get the results he needed.
The flight in question ended tragically when the plane struck the outer guy of a 1000-foot mast and the pilot lost his life. The details of the case will not be discussed here, rather I want to describe how some software I developed a few years ago, for my own leisure, was adapted to try to clarify what happened and to illustrate how, perhaps, the incident could have been avoided.
There were two principal areas to be addressed:
- Create the scene in Google Earth.
- Use the animation software to ‘fly’ the model through the scene.
Creating the Google Earth Scene
There were two masts at the site which we called the ‘west tower’ and the ‘east tower’. The plane crashed into the west tower. The 3D Warehouse provided the initial tower model; this had to be modified in SketchUp to make it more realistic. The following series of clickable images shows some of the ways we made the model look closer to what the agricultural pilot sees on a daily basis. Also, one version of the tower was to include high-visibility sleeves and marker balls (Tana markers) on its outer guys.
The modifications included:
- The original model used rectangular strips to represent the guy wires (figure 1.) and only two of these at each anchor point. The flat guys were replaced with cylinders of the correct diameter, textured to look like weathered steel (figure 2). The number of guys was also increased to four at each anchor.
- High-visibility sleeves were added by drawing and colouring concentric cylinders (figure 3).
- Tana markers were added at suitable intervals (figure 4).
- The anchor points had to be rotated and re-positioned so they coincided with their actual positions at the site (figure 5 and 6). The whole model was scaled and geo-located over multiple iterations to make it as accurate and representative as we could.
A couple of large trees bordered the field and suitable models were placed in the scene (figure 7).
8. M18 aircraft
Lem bought a 3D model of an M18 aircraft, a type commonly used by agricultural pilots and was the aircraft flown on this occasion. I made a few modifications to the model, such as adding the semi-transparent cylinder that simulates propeller rotation. For the animation, the model also had to be oriented so that it would be in straight and level flight and would fly on the heading set by the KML.
Animation software
At the time Lem contacted me I already had some software, written in C#, that was able to animate marine vessels and aeroplanes, as demonstrated by these videos:
- Joshua Slocum Sailing Alone Around The World
- Captain Cook’s Journal During the First Voyage Around The World
- Flight to Fujiyama
Aircraft animations were created from KML input files which included all of the settings that define how an animation should look. One key feature in the specification is the Path, which includes a series of Placemarks, representing the points through which the plane should fly. Settings could be attached at various points in the input to achive certain effects, such as: identify the model to animate; define the speed at which the model should ‘fly’; determine how much the plane should roll for a given change in heading.
I should point out that flight animations move two objects through Google Earth space. One is the model itself, and the other is the camera that follows the model on its journey.
My software, as it existed at the start of the project, would fit spline curves between the Placemarks in a Path for both the model and the camera (see this video for a demonstration, using javascript, of the cubic spline technique).
Cubic Spline Demonstration
The cubic spline curve fitting creates multiple series of intermediate points that define the flight path of the model, and the location and orientation of the following camera.
Having generated these curves, all that remained would be to create the animation, step by step, by moving the model to successive points, modifying its heading, pitch, and roll at each point. Likewise, the following camera would be advanced to its next location and be rotated about its three axes to point at the model.
Software modifications for the crop duster animation
What Lem was asking me to do was to make an animation using about two-and-a-half minutes of GPS data from a system in common use by agricultural aviators which records a position every two seconds. These data-points were much closer together than I had previously used and would need some tweaking of the interpolation routines.
Another change was to provide two types of view, one to give the pilot’s point of view during the flight, and the other to view the flight from a fixed range and orientation.
Finally, the animations needed to be run using historical imagery which would show the position of the Sun at the time of the incident.
Results
The following links take you to the YouTube videos that acted as backups to the animations that Lem would present in court:
In these videos the LineStrings coloured in yellow represent the GPS data-points while the smoother, white lines, shows the results of the cubic spline interpolation. The red line shows an extrapolation of the GPS data from the last data-point recorded to the known location of the crash.
Bookbinding Project #63 – Birthday Card Recycling
Some people excel when it comes to choosing greeting cards. My Great-Aunt-In-Law Gwen is one such person, and my friend Pat is another. They seem able both to understand what will appeal to the recipient and to know where to find the most suitable cards. As a regular visitor to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, Pat has the advantage of having available their superb range of stationery items. She never fails to send me a birthday card of the highest quality. This year, on the occasion of my sixty-third birthday, she sent me their card of Edward Stamp‘s wood engraving of a hedgehog.
I decided that I would say ‘Thank you’ by making her a notebook which used the card as its front cover. Here it is, showing that Pat sees me, entirely accurately, as prickly, dormant, and somewhat endangered:
Recycling Edward Stamp’s wood engraving as a book cover
This was interesting as a bookbinding project because it was the first time that I had started from the final dimensions of the book. Thus far I have always created a book-block, trimmed it, and then cut boards to fit; here I had to create a book-block that would fit the size of the card. I measured the card and allowed enough for it to wrap around a 3mm cover board; this gave the dimensions of the boards; next, I subtracted 4mm from the height and 2mm from the width of the boards to give the size of the book-block.
The next job was to prepare the manufacturer’s mark which comprised the words ‘Handmade Books by Colin Hazlehurst’. This is displayed on the last leaf of the book, so I needed to print it before collating and folding the signatures. I created six signatures of five sheets each using 90 gsm ‘Premium High White’ paper, making a notebook of 120 pages.
Then it was construction as usual: folding, stitching, trimming, glueing, and leaving to dry overnight. I added a headband and a ribbon bookmark as finishing touches.
 The back |
 The manufacturer’s mark |
 Rounded spine, headband, and ribbon |
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2014
Low flying in Yosemite Valley
I am moving all of my Google Earth animations to: tourmaker.wordpress.com. Be sure to visit if you’re interested in that kind of thing.
Madeira – Pearl of the Atlantic
Pay a visit to the Island of Flowers.
Best viewed at 1080p HD on your largest screen.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2014
Uluru from the air
This video is best viewed at 1080p HD resolution on your largest screen.
Learning to fly the Spirit of St. Louis
This video shows the results of experiments animating a model aircraft in Google Earth. You can view the content in Google Earth here: LearningToFly.kml
Draw a cubic spline curve through Google Earth Placemarks
Cubic Spline Demonstration
If you want to draw a spline curve through a set of Placemarks in Google Earth, then this post might help you. I’ve written a script to achieve this (with limitations) and you are welcome to the code which is written in Javascript.
This YouTube video demonstrates the script in action:
You might want to do this, for instance, to create a path for a Camera to follow. I thought at first I would use such a curve to define the flightpath of an animated model aircraft but I realised quite soon that aircraft don’t fly along cubic splines and I needed a different approach to that problem. That’s partly why I’ve only taken the solution this far; I may come back to it later to describe how the camera flies as it follows the aircraft.
It’s not easy or elegant to post code on WordPress so I’m releasing it through Pastebin. At that link you will find an HTML file with embedded Javascript. If you want to try it for yourself you will also need a KML file which has a set of Placemarks in a Folder with id=’PlacemarkFolder’. There is a sample file on Pastebin.
All I’ve done is to bring together bits and pieces from the following resources:
- The Google Code Playground
- The earth api utility library
- cubic spline functions provided by Ivan Kuckir at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University in Prague.
Fragment 1: initialisation
In this code fragment scripts are imported, variables defined, and Google Earth loaded. Note that in the version displayed here the spline calculations are in a separate file, whereas in the source code on Pastebin I’ve dropped them into the main script; this was purely to reduce the number of file downloads you need to get started.
Two buttons are added to the screen:
- A button to fetch a KML file that holds Placemarks. This could be expanded into some sort of file-open dialogue, but I haven’t done that.
- A button to run the spline calculation.
Line 29 is the call to create an instance of the Google Earth plugin; it names the <div> element where it should be displayed and identifies the callback function if the plugin is successfully loaded.
Line 34 calls the resize() function to maximise the size of the Earth viewer.
Fragment 2: resize the screen and initialise the plugin
Line 39 defines the function to resize the Google Earth plugin so it uses most of the available space. A little room is needed beneath the plugin to show the control buttons.
Line 50 defines the callback function which is executed after the plugin is created. The variable ‘gex’ at line 51 becomes an instance of Google Earth Extensions, which is a utility library that the script uses to navigate KML objects.
This is followed by setting up event listeners to monitor the user’s mouse, detecting mousedown, mousemove, and mouseup actions. Together these allow Placemarks to be dragged to new locations. This code was mostly copied from the Google Code Playground, but the code at lines 83 and 84 are extra. The ‘clearLineStrings’ method will remove any existing spline curves from the view, while ‘calculateSpine’ recomputes and redraws the curve based on the new Placemark positions.
Fragment 3: Fetch a KML file containing Placemarks
Line 93 defines a function to fetch and display a KML file. Line 96 sets the URL of the file. The address shown here will be valid for a while but is not guaranteed so, if you want to play with this code, you will need to copy this file (available on Pastebin), or create your own.
If the file is fetched successfully, the object returned is assigned to global variable ‘designInput’. If there’s a top-level view available, either a <LookAt> or a <Camera>, the plugin viewer navigates to that view using the code at line 106.
Fragment 4: Extract Placemarks to an array
The ‘getPlacemarks’ function, at line 111, is used to find the Placemarks in the input file and copy them to an array. Line 120 makes a call to function ‘getObjectById’. This function searches the input file for a Folder node with id set to ‘PlacemarkFolder’; this is how the input file happens to be structured; you might have other Placemarks in it but this method only operates on those that you place in the ‘PlacemarkFolder’. You can change this behaviour easily enough.
If the Folder is found, the GE Extensions API is used to find all the Placemarks it contains. Each Placemark is added to array ‘result’ which is returned to the caller.
Fragment 5: Cubic Spline Part 1
When the KML file has been loaded, you click on the ‘Fit Spline Curve’ button and this action calls the ‘calculateSpline’ function. Line 142 is where ‘getPlacemarks’ is called. If Placemarks were found, the longitude and latitude of each Placemark are extracted and added to their respective arrays (x for longitude and y for latitude). Sorry about the typo at line 144; how unprofessional 🙂
At line 160, Mr. Kuckir’s cubic spline algorithm is called to calculate the required derivatives. It is beyond my ability to describe how this works, so I’m using it as a black box of tricks (see his article for more detail).
Fragment 6: Cubic Spline Part 2
With the derivatives calculated, it is possible to generate the cubic spline curve. This will be displayed as a KmlLineString, so the first thing to do is to create a Placemark to hold the LineString geometry. Notice that the Placemark is created, at line 163, giving it a unique id which begins with the string ‘SplineCurve’. This makes it easier to remove when the input Placemarks are dragged and we want to show the new curve.
The next step is to iterate through successive pairs of Placemarks. The difference between their longitudes is calculated, and that difference is divided into 100 intermediate points (line 172). For each intermediate longitude, a latitude is calculated using the ‘CubicSpline.interpolate’ function (line 181). This point on the spline curve is added to the LineString with the function call at line 187.
When all pairs of Placemarks have been processed, the resulting curve is displayed by added the LineString Placemark to the plugin’s feature list.
Fragment 7: Supporting functions
- addToLineString adds the given point to the given LineString.
- clearLineStrings navigates through the features added to the plugin instance and removes any Placemark that has an id beginning with ‘SplineCurve’.
- getObjectById searches the features in the plugin for an object with the given id.
Fragment 8: Completing the head element and defining the body element
There is one more function to describe; this is the addButton function which was copied from the Google Code Playground. It provides a way to add command buttons to an HTML page.
Finally, the body of the HTML page is defined. The div with id=’viewKML’ is the place where the Google Earth plugin is displayed.
The script has its limitations and, in many ways, it is a first crude attempt at providing a way to draw spline curves between Placemarks. You will need to take it further if you want something more general purpose. The major limitations are:
- The spline curve interpolation assumes that longitude is monotonically increasing; it calculates the latitude for a given longitude.
- The script takes no account of altitude when generating the LineString; all line segments are set to an altitude of 1.0 metres.
- No way is provided to extract the LineString coordinates.
Don’t forget, if you do download the code, I’ve commented out the URL of the KML input file and I would recommend that you create your own and place it on your own server.
Good luck, and a happy new year.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2014
Bookbinding Project #42: Restoring Primitive Physic
In 1747 John Wesley wrote a book called Primitive Physic being an ‘easy and natural method of curing most diseases’. To this he added a ‘general receipt book containing upwards of four hundred of the most useful and valuable receipts’. This book offers an entertaining insight into mid-18th century medicine and domestic life.
While doing the rounds of charity shops on the lookout for a book restoration project, I was asked to see what I could do with a very distressed edition of Wesley’s book published in 1847. The following images show that the book was in a poor state of repair and virtually unusable; the covers were falling off; the first half-dozen signatures had come adrift, and the whole thing felt very fragile.
 front cover |
 back cover |
 spine |
 loose signatures |
The first stage in repairing a book in this condition has the frightening title of ‘tearing apart’. In this instance it was very easy to remove the covers; I simply looked at them and they fell off. Slightly trickier was cutting all the threads to separate the signatures and then easing away as much of the old glue as possible. This was particularly difficult and slow work because it felt as though the pages would rip easily; but my confidence grew as I learnt the strength of the paper.
 detaching the covers |
 separating the signatures |
With a clean set of eighteen signatures, the next step was to work out where the tapes and the new stitches would go. Holding the signature in a clamp between two pieces of cover board, I could judge where to place the tapes so as to avoid all previous holes. I measured the positions and transferred the readings to a piece of board. It’s important to pierce holes in the signatures before starting to stitch. My technique for this is to clamp the signature and the marked-up board to the bench and pierce the signature at the positions marked on the board (see the illustration below).
 working out tape location |
 preparing to pierce a signature |
With the signatures pierced the relaxing task of sewing them back together could begin. I say relaxing, and mostly it was, but I had to stop a few times to reinforce some of the pages where they were worn out; you simply cannot sew fresh air; it has no grip. This was the first book in which I had to use more than one length of thread. I attached a second piece with a bowline, positioning the knot over one of the tapes (see the image below). After the text block was sewn, I attached a strip of mull with a generous amount of glue. The project was beginning to feel more like a book again.
 the sewn textblock |
 attaching the mull |
While the mull was drying I thought about how the cover would look. I searched the web for photos of the original covers, but none were to be found. I came across somebody selling a copy of Primitive Physic on ebay, but its covers were just as unattractive as those I had removed. However, the spine image was decent enough, so I decided that I would put a fairly plain cover on the book itself and create a dust jacket to give it some character.
When the mull was dry I attached endpapers, made from 100gsm vellum laid paper, and rounded the corners to match the book. I trimmed the tapes and mull and started to make the case using 1mm grey board and black buckram for the rounded spine.
 trimmed text block with endpapers attached |
 hard back with rounded spine |
The next task was to cover the boards with a suitable card. I chose a colour that matched both the endpapers and the somewhat discoloured pages of the book. The dust jacket was made creating the design in Word and printing on a Ryman P1 label (A4 size). I attached the label to an A4 sheet of 100gsm bright white paper and then covered the label with self-adhesive cover film (sticky-backed plastic). After trimming to size, I scored the inside faces of the jacket so it would wrap easily around the book. Finally, I cut bevels in the flaps and the job was done.
 completed book |
 dust jacket |
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2013
Spirit of St Louis departing Roosevelt Field
A short video introducing Charles Lindbergh’s flight across the Atlantic in the Spirit of St. Louis.
Anglo-Saxon Roots
I have started making regular visits to the refurbished Central Library in Liverpool. Outside it still has its Victorian façade, but inside is a vast atrium which has echoes of the Guggenheim in New York. I haven’t explored all of it yet, so my favourite room is currently the original Picton Reading Room – a vast circular space lined on three levels with books from floor to ceiling – it’s a cylinder of words.
Through random browsing, I came across the text: Complete Old English (Anglo-Saxon) by Mark Atherton. It’s in the Teach Yourself series, an earlier form of For Dummies, but less jejune. On impulse, I borrowed the book and scanned through it on the bus home. What a surprise when I reached Chapter 10 and saw the heading: These are the bounds of the pasture at Hazelhurst. It turns out that, in 1018, King Cnut granted some land called hæselersc to archbishop Lyfing. That land is in a place that is now called Lower Hazelhurst in Sussex. I know that my name is spelled differently (Hazlehurst), but its origin is surely the same.
This is a transcription of part of the charter, penned in my neatest Chancery almost-but-not-quite-cursive:
Being a reactive sort of a person, I have thrown my time into studying Anglo-Saxon and letting it spill over into another current pastime: bookbinding. After a lifetime of computer programming, I find that traditional craft gives me a level of satisfaction that I used to get from coding. Even so, my first act was to search for and download an Anglo-Saxon font; I chose the Junius font, as recommended by the University of Virginia.
Using this font, my first bookbinding project was a copy of Beowulf in Anglo-Saxon:
I thought this would give me something to translate as my Anglo-Saxon wordhoard grows. I also found, courtesy of the Gutenberg Project, the text of Henry Sweet’s Anglo-Saxon Primer. I bound this as a hardback book:
but immediately found errors in it (mine not Henry’s), so I have on my to-do list to knock this book into shape.
All in all, like Jethro Tull, I’m happy, smiling, and living in the past.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2013
or, to put it another way:
Bookbinding Project #13
Not wanting to miss the opportunity of a bookbinding project, I decided that my great-nephew, George, who will be two years old early next year, might need something to distract him at a wedding we both attended over the Late Summer Bank Holiday.
I found some old index cards that used to belong to George’s great-great-grandfather, Arthur Walker. I folded these and stitched them into a book-block. Then I made a hard cover. The cover design was printed on an A4 label (Ryman P1) which I laminated with some sticky-backed plastic. The cover boards were positioned over the label and pressed down to adhere them.
The purpose of the gift was to give George a diverting activity, so I bought a rainbow of wax crayons which were held to the book with a length of elastic sewn into a loop.
To keep everything together, I wanted to make a slipcase, my first ever. The process for marking out, cutting, and constructing the slipcase I found in Aldren A. Watson’s book: Hand Bookbinding, A Manual of Instruction and followed Sage Reynolds’ video for lining and covering it. I can whole-heartedly recommend the very useful guidance on the topic of bookbinding to be found in the YouTube videos presented by Sage Reynolds.
It gave me a lot of pleasure to create this gift and, of course, George took absolutely no notice of it when there was so much excitement and adventure to be had at the big party.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2013
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: Newport to Fairhaven
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Sailing from Newport, 03Jul1898
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- she waltzed beautifully round the coast…
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- and up the Acushnet River…
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- where I secured her to the cedar spile…I could bring her no nearer home
Slocum and the Spray have returned to the United States after a voyage of 46,000 miles. However, Slocum feels that the spiritual home of the Spray is at Fairhaven, her place of birth. Accordingly, less than a week after completing the circumnavigation, he sails his ship to her home port:
The Spray was not quite satisfied till I sailed her around to her birthplace, Fairhaven, Massachusetts, farther along. I had myself a desire to return to the place of the very beginning whence I had, as I have said, renewed my age. So on July 3, with a fair wind, she waltzed beautifully round the coast and up the Acushnet River to Fairhaven, where I secured her to the cedar spile driven in the bank to hold her when she was launched. I could bring her no nearer home.
…where I secured her to the cedar spile driven in the bank to hold her when she was launched. I could bring her no nearer home.
There is no other way to mark the end of this journey than in Slocum’s own words:
And now, without having wearied my friends, I hope, with detailed scientific accounts, theories, or deductions, I will only say that I have endeavoured to tell just the story of the adventure itself. This, in my own poor way, having been done, I now moor ship, weather-bitt cables, and leave the sloop Spray, for the present, safe in port.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here concludes Chapter XXI of Sailing Alone Around the World and brings Slocum’s adventure to a close.
You can follow the entire voyage in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum where three years, two months, and two days of adventure are compressed into five hours and thirty-three minutes of animation and narration.
Effectively, I have created an audio-book from Slocum’s text and added Google Earth illustration. There should be a name such a work.
- Geobook?
- kpub (it’s a KML publication)?
- suggestions are welcomed
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: Antigua to Newport
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Sailing from Antigua, 05Jun1898
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- The sun directly overhead, 08Jun1898
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- Becalmed in the horse latitudes until 18Jun1898
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- Tornado off Fire Island, 25Jun1898
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- Rounding Montauk Point, early afternoon, 26Jun1898
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- Point Judith was abeam at dark
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- she fetched in at Beavertail next
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- Hugging the rocks to avoid mines
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- Reaching the inner harbour of Newport, 0100 27Jun1898
Slocum sails from Antigua on 05Jun1898. He shapes a course for Cape Hatteras in about 35°N with the intention of coasting along past Chesapeake and Delaware Bays up to New York; a grand finale to the voyage.
The sun passes directly overhead on 08Jun1898 when he is in the latitude of 22° 54’N.
Many think it excessively hot right under the sun. It is not necessarily so. As a matter of fact the thermometer stands at a bearable point whenever there is a breeze and a ripple on the sea, even exactly under the sun. It is often hotter in cities and on sandy shores in higher latitudes.
Several degrees further north Slocum finds the Spray becalmed in the region of the North Atlantic known as the Sargasso Sea. The Sargassum seaweed bunches together into a vast mat around the sloop. For day after day, he can only sit and read and wait for the wind. The smooth and monotonous sea lasts for eight days when a strong south-westerly gale springs up and carries the Spray into the Gulf Stream.
Parts of the sloop’s rigging begin to fail including the peak halyard-block used for controlling the gaff mainsail. More seriously, on 20Jun1898 the jib-stay breaks away at the masthead. This stay is used to carry the jib, but its main function is to hold the mainmast in place. The stay, with the sail attached, falls into the sea but Slocum is able to retrieve it; without the stay the mast sways about ‘like a reed’, but he must climb to the masthead to rig a gun-tackle purchase¹ to secure the mast. He is able to rig a reefed jib to this improvised stay which once again “was soon pulling like a sodger.”
Slocum is now growing weary of the relentless thumping of the waves and the squalls throwing the Spray about. On 23Jun1898 he is pelted by hailstones and subjected to continuous lightning flashes, but there is worse to come; what he calls the climax storm of the voyage:
By slants, however, day and night I worked the sloop in towards the coast, where, on the 25th of June, off Fire Island, she fell into the tornado which, an hour earlier, had swept over New York city with lightning that wrecked buildings and sent trees flying about in splinters; even ships at docks had parted their moorings and smashed into other ships, doing great damage. It was the climax storm of the voyage, but I saw the unmistakable character of it in time to have all snug aboard and receive it under bare poles. Even so, the sloop shivered when it struck her, and she heeled over unwillingly on her beam ends; but rounding to, with a sea-anchor ahead, she righted and faced out the storm.
After the storm, Slocum finds he is closer inshore and, sighting the land, discovers he is some miles to the east of Fire Island. The plan changes; Newport, Rhode Island, is the new destination; he heads eastwards along the coast of Long Island, rounding Montauk Point in the early afternoon. By nightfall, Point Judith is abeam and soon the Beavertail promontory is passed.
The only obstacle now remaining is that the entrance to Newport harbour is mined, owing to the war with Spain. Slocum steers close inshore, hugging the rocks, reasoning that it would be better to have an argument with a rock than with a mine.
Flitting by a low point abreast of the guard-ship, the dear old Dexter, which I knew well, some one on board of her sang out, “There goes a craft!” I threw up a light at once heard the hail, “Spray, ahoy!” It was the voice of a friend, and I knew that a friend would not fire on the Spray. I eased off the main-sheet now, and the Spray swung off for the beacon-lights of the inner harbour. At last she reached port in safety and there, at 1.a.m. on June 27, 1898, cast anchor, after the cruise of more than forty-six thousand miles round the world, during an absence of three years and two months, with two days over for coming up.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here opens Chapter XXI of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Notes
1. A gun-tackle purchase is a simple system of two pulley wheels and a rope.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: Grenada to Antigua
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Sailing from Grenada, 28May1898
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- The Antilles
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- St. Vincent
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- St. Lucia
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- Martinique
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- Dominica
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- Guadeloupe
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- Antigua
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- St. John, Antigua, 01Jun1898
After a pleasant five-day sojourn, Slocum sails from Grenada on 28May1898, and edges along in the lee of the Antilles.
He still has no chart of the Caribbean, a goat having eaten the only one on board, and decides to call in at Dominica to see if they can spare one. A big advantage of a nautical chart is that it shows the anchoring grounds in and around harbours; Slocum finds that he has anchored the Spray in the zone reserved for quarantined vessels. The officious deputy harbour-master, wanting to exert and demonstrate his power, insists that Slocum moves the Spray to the commercial anchorage. Slocum explains that all he wants is a chart and he’ll be on his way, but the official says he can’t have anything until he moves¹.
After some debate, Slocum slips anchor and heads north for Antigua, arriving at St. John on 01Jun1898.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here concludes Chapter XX of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Notes
1. Once again, Slocum uses language that I have chosen not to repeat. He reports the conversation with the officials on Dominica in the local patois and in a form that would be offensive for me to mimic.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: St. Roque to Grenada
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Off Cape St. Rogue, 10May1898
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- Off the mouth of the Amazon
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- Devil’s Island, 17May1898
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- Approaching Tobagp. 20May1898
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- Galera Point Light
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- St. George, Grenada, 23May1898
Slocum is very sensitive to changes in the feel of the Spray; new sounds, new rhythms, all convey important information to him. On 10May1898, he hears and feels the extra ripples, remembered from earlier voyages, created by the Guiana Current which sweeps around Cape St. Roque and runs at 2 miles per hour along the northern coast of South America all the way to Trinidad. For several days in succession he makes one hundred and eighty miles per day.
War with Spain has broken out. Cuba and the surrounding Caribbean is one of the principal theatres. There were some in Cape Town who warned him:
“The Spaniard will get you! The Spaniard will get you!” To all this I could only say that, even so, he would not get much.
Near the mouth of the Amazon the Spray is overhauled by the warship Oregon. She shows the flags “C B T” which mean: “Are there any men-of-war about?” to which Slocum replies: “No,” and adds for our benefit: “I had not been looking for any.”
The Spray passes Cayenne, the capital of French Guiana, and on the grey morning of 17May1898 he sees the dreary Devil’s Island on the lee bow.
On 18May1898 Slocum sees Polaris, the north star, for the first time in three years as the Spray reaches latitude 7° 13’N.
The island of Tobago bears west by north, distance twenty-two miles on the evening of 20May1898. It’s many years since Slocum has been this way and unknown to him, because his chart of the West Indies was eaten by the goat he had on board from St. Helena to Ascension, there is a new lighthouse at Galera Point on Trinidad. As he sails along the north coast of Tobago he thinks he sees waves breaking on a reef. He throws the sloop offshore but continues to see the white tops of the waves wherever he goes. It seems that no matter which way he steers the reef is all about him. Finally, as the Spray is lifted slightly higher on a wave, the realisation dawns that he is seeing the light from Trinidad playing rhythmically on the waves.
Taking no risks, he tacks back and forth for the rest of the night and then heads out for Grenada, seventy miles to the north-west. He anchors in St. George roads at midnight on 22May1898 and sails into the inner harbour the following morning. The voyage from Cape Town to Grenada has taken forty-two days.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here opens Chapter XX of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: Ascension to Fernando de Noronha
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Ascension Island
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- Green Mountain, Ascension
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- Crossing the track of the outbound voyage, 08May1898
Slocum stays on Ascension for three nights¹. He hands over the mail placed in his care at St. Helena and takes lunch with Captain Blaxland, the commander of the island.
On the following day (28Apr1898) he walks to the summit of the island — a peak known as Green Mountain — where a soil profile has developed to the extent that some crops can be grown and rugged pastures support cattle and sheep. A Canadian farmer, Mr. Schank, and his sister are in charge and they give Slocum a tour of the holding.
Rollers crash against the coast making it impossible to take a boat out to the Spray, which is anchored safely in deeper water. Slocum stays in the garrison sharing stories with the officers of the “Stone Frigate R.N.”, the nickname of Ascension Island.
He boards the Spray on the evening of the 29th. Before departure the following day, the sloop is fumigated below decks in an attempt to demonstrate that Slocum is sailing alone. The idea is that nobody could remain concealed below and would have to reveal themselves. With a certificate to affirm that he is the only person on board, Slocum sets sail.
Heading for home, the Spray is on a course that crosses her outbound track of 02Oct1895. On 08May1898 she passes to the south of Fernando de Noronha, an island off the coast of Brazil.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here concludes Chapter XIX of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Notes
1. Either Slocum was a little confused about his dates or the proof-reader of the edition I use didn’t catch this error. The text states first of all: “On the 27th of April the Spray arrived at Ascension…”; the lunch with Captain Blaxland is reported, and the visit to Schank’s farm on Green Mountain is described as taking place “on the following day”; then the text reads: “On the 26th of April, while I was ashore…” I suspect that this should read: “On the 28th of April,…” This might seem pedantic, but I need this level of accuracy to make sense of the voyage.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: St. Helena to Ascension
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Approaching St. Helena, 11Apr1898
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- Jamestown, St. Helena
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- Plantation House, the governor’s residence
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- Longwood House, Napeleon’s residence on St. Helena
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- Sailing from St. Helena, 20Apr1898
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- Arrival at Ascension, 27Apr1898
After a passage of 1700 miles in 16 days, Slocum arrives at the island of St. Helena on 11Apr1898. He anchors the Spray off Jamestown and goes ashore to pay his respects to the governor, Sir R.A. Sterndale. Once more he is treated well by the dignitaries; in return for two presentations about his voyage he is invited to stay overnight at Plantation House, the governor’s residence up in the hills behind Jamestown; but it’s a double-edged sword — the ‘west room’ where he stays is supposedly haunted and he doesn’t get much sleep:
…the butler, by command of his Excellency, put me up in [the west room]. Indeed, to make sure that no mistake had been made, his Excellency came later to see that I was in the right room, and to tell me all about the ghosts he had seen or heard of. He had discovered all but one, and wishing me pleasant dreams, he hoped I might have the honor of a visit from the unknown one of the west room. For the rest of the chilly night I kept the candle burning, and often looked from under the blankets, thinking that maybe I should meet the great Napoleon face to face; abut I saw only furniture, and the horseshoe that was nailed over the door opposite my bed.
The governor takes Slocum on a tour of the island; on the way back to Jamestown with a fellow American, he visits Longwood, the house in which Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled for the last six years of his life. He died there on 05May1821.
After a lunch at the castle and on receipt of gifts: a large fruit cake from Lady Sterndale, the governor’s wife, and a bag of coffee in the husk from the governor, Slocum sails from St. Helena on 20Apr1898. His companion on the voyage to Ascension is a goat, donated by Clark, an American acquaintance, who claims it would be as friendly as a dog and would bring the benefit of butting the coffee beans out of their pods. Unfortunately, the goat has an appetite for anything and everything edible from grass ropes to Slocum’s straw hat, and his paper chart of the West Indies. Needless to say, the goat is put ashore on arrival at Ascension on 27Apr1898.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here introduces Chapter XIX of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Notes
1. At the time of writing the island of St. Helena does not display as well as it could when using the Google Earth plug-in, regardless of the browser used; the imagery is very low resolution and the terrain detail is absent. Both of these features are displayed correctly in Google Earth itself. Until this problem is resolved, I have provided a button in the contents against this part of the voyage that allows you to download the kml file to Google Earth. If you also have a problem with that option, you can download it at this url: Chapter XIX part 1
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: Cape Town to St. Helena
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- A journey inland to Pretoria
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- Mr. Krüger corrected the judge, rather sharply, reminding him that the world is flat
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- In the Alfred dry-dock
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- Cape Observatory
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- Visiting Worcester and Wellington
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- Sailing from Cape Town, 26Mar1898
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- Becalmed in a heavy swell with Table Mountain as a back-drop
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- Reefed mainsail with a flying jib on the Vailima bamboo
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- Twenty miles from St. Helena, 11Apr1898
With the Spray in Alfred dry-dock and a free railway pass in his pocket, Slocum heads inland, making a journey to Kimberley, Johannesburg, and Pretoria. He meets President Krüger, a confirmed believer in the flat-earth hypothesis. Judge Beyers introduces Slocum to Krüger, but makes the mistake of saying he is sailing “round the world”.
“Impossible,” says Krüger angrily; you mean “in the world.”
Slocum checks on the Spray and finds all is well; then he visits Dr. Gill, astronomer royal, at the Cape Observatory. Gill organises a lecture about the voyage which is so well attended that Slocum earns enough money to cover his expenses both during his extended stay in South Africa and the voyage home. In fact Slocum spends three months in South Africa; this is longer than the fastest non-stop solo sailors of today take for the entire voyage.
It’s 26Mar1898 before Slocum is towed out to the offing by the tug Tigre where the spray wallows in a heaving sea without wind for more than a day. It’s a good view:
The light morning breeze, which scantily filled her sails when the tug let go the tow-line, soon died away altogether, and left her riding over a heavy swell, in full view of Table Mountain and the high peaks of the Cape of good Hope. For a while the grand scenery served to relieve the monotony. One of the old circumnavigators (Sir Francis Drake I think), when her first saw this magnificent pile, sang, “‘t is the fairest thing and the grandest cape I’ve seen in the whole circumference of the earth.”
On the second day, the swell shortens; Slocum interprets this, correctly, as meaning that a wind is on the way. He gets under sail and rapidly pulls away from the cape. Once more the pilot of the Pinta is at the helm and Slocum is able to spend long days avidly reading the books he picked up at Cape Town.
Fifteen days later, on 11Apr1898, Slocum is called on deck by the quack of a booby:
Very early that morning I was awakened by that rare bird, the booby, with its harsh quack, which I recognised at once as a call to go on deck; it was as much as to say, “Skipper, there’s land in sight.” I tumbled out quickly and, sure enough, away ahead in the dim twilight, about twenty miles off, was St. Helena.
The sections of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here conclude Chapter XVIII of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
Joshua Slocum in Google Earth: Port Natal to Cape Town
Follow Joshua Slocum’s Sailing Alone Around the World at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
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- Sailing from Port Natal, 14Dec1897
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- “The distance to Table Bay…was about 800 miles”
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- Algoa Bay and Santa Cruz Island
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- Cape Agulhas, 27Dec1897
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- Sheltering in Simons Bay
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- “She beat around the Cape of Good Hope, where they say the Flying Dutchman is still sailing”
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- Anchored in the bay off the city of Cape Town
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- Approaching the Alfred dry dock
Slocum sails from Port Natal [Durban] on 14Dec1897. The passage to Cape Town is about 800 miles. When the Spray is at her best it would take Slocum about one week to cover this distance; however, he expects the weather to be rough even though he has waited and waited for the southern summer to develop. His expectations are met:
On Christmas, 1897, I came to the pitch of the cape. On this day the Spray was trying to stand on her head, and she gave me every reason to believe that she would accomplish the feat before night. she began very early in the morning to pitch and toss about in a most unusual manner¹, and I have to record that, while I was at the end of the bowsprit reefing the jib, she ducked me under water three times for a Christmas box.
A large English steamer passing ran up the signal, “Wishing you a Merry Christmas.” I think the captain was a humorist; his own ship was throwing her propeller out of water.
Two days later the Spray is passing Cape Agulhas, the southernmost point of the African continent, 13 days from Port Natal and with 120 miles still to cover. The winds are more moderate now, but there is still one more gale to come. He shelters in Simons Bay [False Bay] until the wind slackens then he beats the Spray around the Cape of Good Hope, accurately named by early Portuguese navigators as the “Cape of Storms.”
Thirty-five nautical miles later, the Spray runs into calm water in the shelter of Table Mountain. Slocum is in reflective mood; despite sailing alone for so long he anchors in the bay, “clear of the bustle of commerce”, and takes a day to contemplate his achievement of negotiating both Cape Horn and the Cape of Good Hope single-handed.
The next day, he sails the Spray into dry dock where she remains for three months. Slocum does not record the date of his arrival at Cape Town; perhaps it was two or three days after passing Cape Agulhas, which would make it 29Dec or 30Dec1897.
The section of Joshua Slocum’s journey reported here opens Chapter XVIII of Sailing Alone Around the World, and this post is a trailer for the adventure that I am retelling in Google Earth at: http://www.hazelhurst.net/Slocum
Notes
1. To simulate pitching and tossing “in a most unusual manner”, I combined animations on all three axes by specifying AnimatedPitch, AnimatedRoll, and AnimatedYaw in the TourMaker Input File for this section of the passage.
Copyright © Colin Hazlehurst, 2012
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