Whether using binoculars, a small telescope or the naked-eye, the Heavens-Above
website can help you to find your way around the night-time sky. In addition to detailed
sky charts, their website will help you find planets, asteriods, comets, satellites and their tracks across the sky.
To give accurate results, Heavens-Above requires the latitude and longitude of your location. As a starting point, when we link to Heavens-Above,
we pass this GPS location for Sontag:
31.652389, -90.204255
Once you're on the Heavens-Above website, you can improve its accuracy by giving a more precise longitude and latitude as your actual position.
We found one communities that are also named Sontag.
Within Mississippi, the name Sontag is unique.
Beyond Mississippi, there is another community also named Sontag in the United States.
Communities Elsewhere In North America ...
Virginia
Franklin County
We found mention of this community, but have little information.<1> For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Virginia community of Sontag [Franklin County].
Curious and Interesting Names Near Sontag ...
As we travel, we always see a community with a name that gives pause. While there are names which are interesting or familiar, some catch our attention or strike our fancy. We always wonder about such a name. If time permits and the community is not too far, we'll usually try to make a side-trip.
We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Sontag to various places of note, such as the White House.
With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance<2> beginning in Sontag and extending to:
Jackson, which is the State Capital of Mississippi, lies 45 miles [72.4 km]<2> to the north (N). If you could walk a straight line from Sontag to Jackson, with an average speed<3> of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour, it would take about three full days to make the trip. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take most of two days.
The White House (Washington, DC) is 893 miles [1,437.1 km] to the northeast (NE). Driving, with an average speed of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, would take most of two days, a buggy would take 35 days and walking would take 51 days.
The shortest distance<4> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,783 miles [10,916.2 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<5>
The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 7,494 miles [12,060.4 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<6>
The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 5,370 miles [8,642.2 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<7>'
Footnotes ...
<1>
If we encounter the name of what might be a community, our methodology is to add that name to our Gazetteer as a placeholder. As we find more information about that community, it will be added to our Gazetteer.
Just as a reminder: Our definition of a community is rather broad and includes those places (or areas) where several families lived and had a name which identified that place. For example, you might hear somebody say that they are going over to Mile's to see Pete ... Mile's is just a gas station and a couple of homes at the crossroads. While it might not be on the map, everybody in the area knows it by that name.
Places of interest include buildings at a crossroad, several families clustered in a hollow or maybe the location of a way station. It also includes places like mines, lumber camps, ferry crossings, etc. The community might still exist, is now gone or only existed for just a short period of time.
Also keep in mind that Sontag could have been on the original document by mistake, misspelled, the original/alternate name of a community that we've listed elsewhere or was placed in the wrong county. Sometimes a post office or train station would have a different name than the community where it's located, so two names might be referring to the same community - we're working to straighten it all out.
<2>
Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Sontag) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<3>
While we have tried to pick reasonable speeds, the rate of travel is very theoretical - obstacles like fences, hills, lakes, river crossings and rest stops have been ignored. When we say 'Days' of travel, we're assuming 8 hours of travel per day.
<4>
The shortest line can be visualized by stretching a string on a Globe from Point A to Point B - this is known as a Great Circle Route. Where you might expect the shortest route from Sontag to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Sontag. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 31.6524, Longitude: -90.2043 In this case, the coordinates for Sontag have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<5>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 315.588 degrees.
<6>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 311.25 degrees.
<7>
The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 312.01 degrees.