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Even modern pilots (without GPS) use rivers and highways. Why couldn't 1920s pilots use railroads?

• adaml_623 13y ago
  But planes and pilots can take short cuts over mountains and terrain that railroads have to go around. Navigating these shorter routes might have been harder but would definitely be worth it in fuel and time savings
  • jonah 13y ago
    Also night time and all the roads looking the same after a while.
• Sanddancer 13y ago
  The arrows and beacons were designed for night usage, where it's a lot harder to see railroad tracks. The arrows themselves seem to be much more the supplemental part of the system, to give a general idea where the next beacon's going to be.
• ChuckMcM 13y ago
  Modern joke "What do you mean by IFR" it means "I follow Roads"
  • jff 13y ago
    With the extra joke being that following roads is actually VFR and that you most likely couldn't follow roads in IFR.
    • JshWright 13y ago
      If that's the extra joke... What's the primary joke?
      • jff 13y ago
        "Haha IFR is a fancy-sounding term but you really mean you just find a road and follow it to your destination as though you were in a car"
  • cjrp 13y ago
    I've heard it as "Vee Follow Roads" since it's VFR where you're more likely to use ground features
• keenerd 13y ago
  It was often hard to tell these features apart from up in the air. There are many instances of pilots losing races because they followed the wrong rail line. For a really in-depth history of pre-electronic navigation, check out "Most Probable Position" by Wright, http://www.amazon.com/Most-Probable-Position-History-Navigation/dp/0700600922 http://www.amazon.com/Most-Probable-Position-History-Navigat...