A bearing is a measurement of direction between two points. Bearings are generally given in one of two formats, an azimuth bearing or a quadrant bearing. An azimuth bearing uses all 360?? of a compass to indicate direction. The compass is numbered clockwise from north (0?? is north, 90?? is east, etc.), so a bearing of 42?? would be northeast, a bearing of 200?? would be southeast, and so on.
. For quadrant bearings the compass is divided into four sections, each containing 90??. The two quadrants in northern half of the compass are numbered from 0?? to 90?? away from north (clockwise in the east, counterclockwise in the west). In the southern half of the compass, the two quadrants are numbered away from south (counterclockwise in the east, clockwise in the west). Quadrant bearings are given in the format N40??E (northeast), S26??W (southwest). Whenever you measure a quadrant bearing, it should always be recorded with north or south listed first, followed by the number of degrees away from north or south, and the direction (east or west) away from north or south. In other words, you would never give a quadrant bearing as E40??N or W24??S. Normally, the quadrant method of reporting bearings is easiest to use. One advantage is in converting from a bearing to its mirrored bearing in the opposite direction. Azimuths are useful when you need to process them using a computer because each bearing can be represented by a single number. Example :- To convert a bearing of N30??W into an azimuth angle, the angle location must be in the northwest quadrant. Then, draw an angle of 30?? from the north end of the reference meridian because you measure azimuth angles clockwise from the north end of the reference meridian. To compute this azimuth angle, subtract 30?? from 360??; the result is 330??. Therefore, the bearing of N30?? W is equal to 330?? azimuth angle.
