[jtarrio]

The nautical mile is the length of a minute of arc along a great circle on the surface of Earth. I think the 14.4m figure is wrong; that should be 15.4m, which is the distance covered in 30 seconds by a vessel going at 1 nautical mile per hour.

[maxerickson]

I'm randomly reading some of the links here. The Wikipedia article on the Chip log associates the 14.4 meters with a 28 second sandglass.