Question

In the Mercator projection, what happens to landmasses that are far from the equator?

Options:
A. They shrink in size
B. They expand in size
C. They maintain accurate proportions
D. They are not represented

Answer 1

In the Mercator projection, landmasses far from the equator expand in size due to the cylindrical map projection method it uses. This leads to significant distortions of the true sizes of countries and continents as one moves away from the equator.

Step-by-step explanation:

In the Mercator projection, landmasses far from the equator expand in size. This distortion happens because the Mercator projection is a cylindrical map projection, which represents the globe on a flat surface. Because of this, the scale increases with latitude, which means that the closer you get to the poles, the more the map exaggerates the size of countries and continents.

For example, Greenland appears nearly the same size as Africa on a Mercator map, when in reality, Africa is several times larger.

Gerardus Mercator, a Belgian mapmaker, designed this projection in 1569 primarily for maritime navigation. Although the projection has been widely used for centuries, it is important to be aware of the distortions it introduces, especially for educational and geographical comparison purposes.