I think you've tripped up with your numbers somewhere. Four million fishing vessels averaging 25m each gives you 100,000km, enough to circle the entire Earth twice over with plenty to spare

if you sent the people with the biggest arm span to the open water. I say it would be worth it.

You're just trying to get rid of NBA players and the Dutch, aren't you?

Easier plan:

Most people are capable of floating on the surface of the ocean. You just need to:

• optimize the path across land so the fewest number of people need to be in the ocean
• put all the babies, olds, and infirm people on land
• pack container ships to the gills with floaters
• dump them out in a line across the ocean

Granted you still need a bunch of ships but the complications around connecting them all are gone.

My general thoughts would say to go along the west coast of the Americas. You've got Canada, the Rockies, Chile, and Antarctica. Though I'm not sure where it comes out at the other side.

Edit: nope, ignore me, that line misses Antarctica entirely and doesn't reach land until you get to the Philippines 😂

To be fair, it's got to be somewhere around there as you ideally want to miss the Pacific Ocean entirely. Yes you hit the Indian Ocean, but then the line would go up Eastern Asia and back around to Alaska.

Edit 2: if you draw a line directly down Chile, it his Antarctica, Western Australia, China, Russia, Greenland, Eastern Canada then back down the Atlantic to Venezuela.

My shoulder joints popped from just reading this.

The equator is a one dimensional imaginary object. This means it's infinitely small in its width. Not its height. Sooooo.... Yeah... You would still need many many people and sacrifice quite a few of them in the ocean for the greater good.