If you’re shooting past, say, 1,000 yards, you should be aware of how the rotation of the earth affects your bullet’s trajectory. This is called the Coriolis Effect and I tried my darndest in the video above to explain how it works and how to avoid missing that long shot.
TL:DR version:
- If you’re on the equator, you’re moving East at about 1,040 MPH while the Earth completes a full rotation in 24 hours. As you get farther from the equator and closer toward the North or South Pole, you slow down (smaller and smaller diameter circle, still 24 hours to go around it)
- If you’re shooting North or South, either you or your target is moving faster (if you’re in the Northern Hemisphere shooting South, your target is moving faster than you are).
- The difference in speed between you and your target causes point of impact drift.
- If you’re shooting East or West, your target is rotating around the curvature of the Earth (so are you, but once your bullet’s in the air it’s no longer connected to the Earth) and you miss high or low because of it.
- How do you know if your compass heading will make you miss left, right, up, or down? Watch the video above and find out!
And the thing you think is stationary, is also in motion, in several axis at the same time, like the orbit around the sun, the orbit of our solar system in the milky way galaxy, and maybe others.
Your actual track through the universe is a cork-screw spiral motion…