'Earth sandwich': Planet 'filling' between bread in Andalucía and New Zealand

TWO men have made a sandwich with the planet as its filling after finding each other on Reddit – each buttered the bread and laid it at exactly the same time and at exact opposite ends of the earth.

New Zealand-based IT student Étienne Naude, 19, studied the longitude and latitude of Bucklands Beach in Auckland to find the precise opposite point on earth, then started searching for a volunteer in the Antipodes of his home town – which turned out to be on the cusp of the provinces of Cádiz and Málaga.

Through Reddit, he found Ángel Sierra, 34, a chef, who was willing to lay the other slice of bread on the 'earth sandwich'.

They worked on locating the exact spot either side of the planet on Google Maps, to within a few metres, then zoomed in on Street View to make sure they were directly opposite each other to the millimetre.

As well as calculating precise distances to ensure the two slices of bread were level with each other 12,724 kilometres apart, they had to make certain they laid them at exactly the same time.

This involved some considerable coordination, since there is a 12-hour time lag between Auckland and mainland Spain during the northern hemisphere winter, the latter being half a day behind.

Working out the precise end-to-end spot on earth is harder than it looks, Naude says – it was difficult to find a place 'which wasn't water' on the New Zealand side, or where public roads, paths and buildings did not get in the way.

Naude drew a logo on his own piece of bread – a picture of the planet with two large slices, one on either side.

The actual distance they would need to travel to get to their respective Antipodes is over 20,000 kilometres, but the mass of planet between the slices was 12,724 kilometres, the distance as the crow flies through the centre of the earth.

Photograph: Reddit