> [!quote] From [The VOR Visualised (as a lighthouse)](http://andrewskretvedt.blogspot.com/2010/05/vor-visualised-as-lighthouse.html) > Imagine a [[VOR]] station, not as a radio beacon, but as a lighthouse. It has a bright white rotating beacon, which emits a powerful beam in a single direction and rotates at a constant speed, say one RPM, sweeping clockwise when viewed from above. Now, imagine that as the beam rotates through north, a red beacon on top of the lighthouse flashes at the instant the rotating beam hit 360 degrees. > > If you were standing due north from this lighthouse, staring south back at it, you would see the white beam rotate past you giving you a flash of white as it hit 360 degrees. You would also see the red beacon above flash at the same instant. Now, the steady white beacon is still rotating, one RPM, or in other words, six degrees per second. > > If you were now at some random location nearby the lighthouse, knowing its configuration as we do, once you sighted the beacon on the horizon, you would be able to quickly determine your location relative to the beacon by timing the appearance of the red and white flashes. Start your stopwatch when you see the red beacon flash. Stop timing when you see the steady white rotating beacon sweep past you.... > > For each additional second between the red and white flashes, you are located someplace along a bearing from the lighthouse, 6 additional degrees from the north reference. These bearings radiating away from the station are then known as **radials**. If you know the timing between the red and white pulses, you know which radial you are _on_. #flight-instruction-tips