Can you see the Statue of Liberty from Battery Park, Manhattan?

Yes, you can

2.8 km line of sight toward the southwest (bearing 236°), computed on 30 m Copernicus terrain with Earth curvature and standard atmospheric refraction.

The answer

Yes. The Statue of Liberty is visible from Battery Park, Manhattan: a clear 2.8 km line of sight over the ground in between, with its top 98 m above eye level. At this range Earth's curvature takes off less than a metre.

The cheapest view of the statue in New York costs nothing: walk to the southern railing of Battery Park and look across the water, which is what the ferry queue beside you is paying for.

Satellite map with the sightline from Battery Park, Manhattan to the Statue of Liberty drawn in red — The 2.8 km sightline over satellite imagery, drawn as the great-circle path light would follow.

Straight-line distance2.8 km

Direction236° southwest

Observer eye level2 m

Target elevation101 m

Curvature drop at the target1 m

Above your eye level98 m

From Battery Park, Manhattan, at an eye level of 2 m, the sightline to the Statue of Liberty runs 2.8 km and clears every ridge in between. Over that distance Earth's curvature drops the target 1 m below a flat-earth line, but at 101 m, it still rises above the horizon. The view is geometrically real: whether you actually get it depends on haze, not terrain. The tightest squeeze is mid-path, where the sightline passes just 4 m above the terrain at km 0.1.

Two and a half kilometres of open harbour with nothing in between. At eye level the curvature of the Earth hides under half a metre of the pedestal, which is why the statue looks like it is standing on the water rather than behind it.

The terrain profile

Elevation profile from Battery Park, Manhattan to the Statue of Liberty. Like every elevation profile, the vertical axis is stretched (≈5× here), but the geometry is real: mid-path, Earth's surface genuinely stands 0 m above the straight line between the two points (the dashed arc is sea level). Light bends only slightly around that bulge, so whatever it covers stays hidden.

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Frequently asked questions

Can you see the Statue of Liberty from Battery Park, Manhattan?

Yes. The terrain-limited line of sight is clear across 2.8 km, accounting for Earth's curvature and standard atmospheric refraction. Atmospheric haze is the only thing that can hide the view.

How far is the Statue of Liberty from Battery Park, Manhattan in a straight line?

2.8 km great-circle distance, on a bearing of 236° (southwest).

How much does Earth's curvature hide over 2.8 km?

At the target's distance the curvature drop is about 1 m: anything lower than that (relative to the observer's horizon plane) is hidden behind the bulge of the Earth. The Statue of Liberty is tall enough to rise above it.

How was this calculated?

UpToWhere walks the full terrain profile between the two points on 30 m-resolution Copernicus GLO-30 elevation data, applying Earth curvature and standard atmospheric refraction (k = 0.13), the same physics surveyors use. You can run the same point-to-point check between any two places on Earth.

More famous sightlines

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