Earth
As of 2012 the most used prime meridian for the Earth is the IERS Reference Meridian (IRM). It passes about 5.3 arcseconds east of Airy's transit circle or about 102 metres (335 ft) at the latitude of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, London. A current convention on the Earth uses the opposite of the IRM as the basis for the International Date Line.
Read more about this topic: Prime Meridian
Famous quotes containing the word earth:
“If there is anybody in this land who thoroughly believes that the meek shall inherit the earth they have not often let their presence be known.”
—W.E.B. (William Edward Burghardt)
“It was a Sunday afternoon, wet and cheerless; and a duller spectacle this earth of ours has not to show than a rainy Sunday in London.”
—Thomas De Quincey (1785–1859)
“Russian forests crash down under the axe, billions of trees are dying, the habitations of animals and birds are layed waste, rivers grow shallow and dry up, marvelous landscapes are disappearing forever.... Man is endowed with creativity in order to multiply that which has been given him; he has not created, but destroyed. There are fewer and fewer forests, rivers are drying up, wildlife has become extinct, the climate is ruined, and the earth is becoming ever poorer and uglier.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)