Long distance mirror signalling.

Long distance mirror signalling.
This video shows me signalling over twenty seven and a half miles (44 Kilometres) using a mirror in bright sunlight, the mirror was 13 inches by 10.5 inches (330mm X 254mm)
It takes an hour to drive from Aberporth to Aberystwyth following the coast road, it’s a distance of some 33.5 miles but the straight line distance is 27.5 miles over the sea.
I was at home near the village of Aberporth with the mirror and Carol, my wife’s best friend, was in Aberystwyth when she made the video for me.
I'm very grateful to Carol for taking the video as Sophie, my wife took a video at the same time but Sophie’s camera focused on the near distance where as Carol was able to get a usable video, in fact Carol emailed the video to us when she got back home to America.
There are a number of videos on YouTube that show you the best way to use a signal mirror in a distressed situation but I couldn’t find any videos showing signalling over a long distance.
What I don’t show in this video is that I had a bamboo cane in the ground about 14 foot (4 meters) in front of me, I lined up the target area (Aberystwyth) with my eye and the top of the cane and then with the mirror where my eye was. I flashed the mirror such that sunlight hit the top of the cane and subsequently over to Aberystwyth. In other words, I couldn’t see where the light was been directed but by seeing the light hitting the top of the pole I knew I was getting it right. Emergency signal mirrors have a hole in the middle so as you can line up the target. I did try using the shinny surface of a CD/DVD but the girls couldn’t see it over that distance but they probably could have if they had binoculars.
Over 27 miles the difference between someone in Aberystwyth acutely seeing the reflection or missing it down to an extremely narrow angle of error.
Many that’s to Carol, as I said I’ve wanted to see this since I was about 7 years old.
Kind Regards . . . Andy

Видео Long distance mirror signalling. канала AndyDaviesByTheSea