Christian Flat Earth Ministry

Surveyors, engineers and architects are never required to factor the supposed curvature of the Earth into their projects, providing another proof the world is a plane, not a planet. Canals and railways, for example, are always cut and laid horizontally, often over hundreds of miles, without any allowance for curvature.

One surveyor, Mr. T. Westwood, wrote into the January, 1896 “Earth Review” magazine stating that, “In leveling, I work from Ordinance marks, or canal levels, to get the height above sea level. The puzzle to me used to be, that over several miles each level was and is treated throughout its whole length as the same level from end to end; not the least allowance being made for curvature. One of the civil engineers in this district, after some amount of argument on each side as to the reason why no allowance for curvature was made, said he did not believe anybody would know the shape of the earth in this life.”

Another Surveyor and Engineer of thirty years wrote to the Birmingham Weekly Mercury, Feb. 15th, 1890 stating, “I am thoroughly acquainted with the theory and practice of civil engineering. However bigoted some of our professors may be in the theory of surveying according to the prescribed rules, yet it is well known amongst us that such theoretical measurements are INCAPABLE OF ANY PRACTICAL ILLUSTRATION. All our locomotives are designed to run on what may be regarded as TRUE LEVELS or FLATS. There are, of course, partial inclines or gradients here and there, but they are always accurately defined and must be carefully traversed. But anything approaching to eight inches in the mile, increasing as the square of the distance, COULD NOT BE WORKED BY ANY ENGINE THAT WAS EVER YET CONSTRUCTED. Taking one station with another all over England and Scotland, it may be stated that all the platforms are ON THE SAME RELATIVE LEVEL. The distance between Eastern and Western coasts of England may be set down as 300 miles. If the prescribed curvature was indeed as represented, the central stations at Rugby or Warwick ought to be close upon three miles higher than a chord drawn from the two extremities. If such was the case there is not a driver or stoker within the Kingdom that would be found to take charge of the train. We can only laugh at those of your readers who seriously give us credit for such venturesome exploits, as running trains round spherical curves. Horizontal curves on levels are dangerous enough, vertical curves would be a thousand times worse, and with our rolling stock constructed as at present physically impossible.”

Engineer, W. Winckler, wrote into the Earth Review October 1893 regarding the Earth’s supposed curvature, stating, “As an engineer of many years standing, I saw that this absurd allowance is only permitted in school books. No engineer would dream of allowing anything of the kind. I have projected many miles of railways and many more of canals and the allowance has not even been thought of, much less allowed for. This allowance for curvature means this – that it is 8” for the first mile of a canal, and increasing at the ratio by the square of the distance in miles; thus a small navigable canal for boats, say 30 miles long, will have, by the above rule an allowance for curvature of 600 feet. Think of that and then please credit engineers as not being quite such fools. Nothing of the sort is allowed. We no more think of allowing 600 feet for a line of 30 miles of railway or canal, than of wasting our time trying to square the circle”

“If the earth be the globe of popular belief, it is very evident that in cutting a canal, an allowance must be made for the curvature of the globe, which allowance would correspond to the square of the distance multiplied by eight inches. From The Age, of 5th August 1892, I extract the following: ‘The German Emperor performed the ceremony of opening the Gates of the Baltic and North Sea Canal, in the spring of 1891. The canal starts at Holtenau, on the south side of Kiel Bay, and joins the Elbe 15 miles above its mouth. It is 61 miles long, 200 feet wide at the surface and 85 feet at the bottom, the depth being 28 feet. No locks are required, as the surface of the two seas is level.’ Let those who believe it is the practice for surveyors to make allowance for ‘curvature’ ponder over the following from the Manchester Ship Canal Company (Earth Review, October, 1893) ‘It is customary in Railway and Canal constructions for all levels to be referred to a datum which is nominally horizontal and is so shown on all sections. It is not the practice in laying out Public Works to make allowances for the curvature of the earth.” –Thomas Winship, “Zetetic Cosmogeny”

The London and Northwestern Railway forms a straight line 180 miles long between London and Liverpool. The railroad’s highest point, midway at Birmingham station, is only 240 feet above sea-level. If the world were actually a globe, however, curveting 8 inches per mile squared, the 180 mile stretch of rail would form an arc with the center point at Birmingham raising a full 5,400 feet above London and Liverpool. Adding the station’s actual height (240 feet) to its theoretical inclination (5,400 feet) gives 5,640 feet as the rail’s necessary height on a globe-Earth, more than a thousand feet taller than Ben Nevis, the tallest mountain in Great Britain!

“In projecting railways on a globe, the datum line would be the arc of a circle corresponding to the latitude of the place. That the datum line for the railway projections is always a horizontal line, proves that the general configuration of the world is horizontal. To support the globe theory, the gentlemen of the observatories should call upon the surveyor to prove that he allows the necessary amount for ‘curvature.’ But this is what the learned men dare not do, as it is well-known that the allowance for the supposed curvature is never made.” –Thomas Winship, “Zetetic Cosmogeny”

“In a long line, like that of the Great Pacific Railway, extending across North America, the supposed curvature would, of course, be proportionately great, extending to many miles in height, but not one inch was allowed by the engineers for curvature during the whole course of the construction of that vast line of Railway. And, if we think of it, how could it be otherwise? All Railway metals must, of necessity, be straight, for how could any engine or carriage run with safety on a convex surface?” –David Wardlaw Scott, “Terra Firma”