Bearings

Imagine you are at a point A and you want to go to a point B. You must travel in the direction that takes you from point A to point B. You can plot the positions of A and B, and find the bearing from A to B by superimposing on A a compass, with angles labelled from 0 to 360 degrees.

We can then just read off the bearing from A to B.

If A and B are given as position vectors

andthen it is useful to find the vectorand plot it, on a compass with the centre of the compass acting as A.

The bearing will be given by

ifandare both positive

ifis negative and is positive

ifandare both negative

ifis positive andis negative