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Author
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Topic: Practical Status of Celestial Nav in 2014
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Bob Goethe
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posted October 07, 2014 12:15 PM
I know that passing a celestial navigation exam is required by the USCG for various licenses.
By the same token, passing a celestial navigation exam is required to get your offshore certification from the Canadian Yachting Association (CYA).
But we all know that:
1. Being able to pass a written exam is no indicator that you will retain or use that knowledge later on.
2. Celestial nav is NOT like riding a bike. If you are not taking/reducing sights every so often, your ability to do so will decay. If you want to be able to use a sextant in an emergency situation, you need to engage in at least occasional practice to retain your skills.
I know one senior CYA instructor who did a single handed circumnavigation of the earth...and didn't even have a sextant on board. All she had in the way of navigational redundancy were four or five handheld GPS units.
I have been involved in developing medical software, and I know that even if a radiologist has been specifically trained and certified to read mammograms (breast x-rays), they are required to read X mammograms per year to keep their certification up. It is a perception that if you don't do this regularly, you will be unable to spot cancer on an x-ray.
Similarly, I expect that unless people do X celestial sights per year, they will be unable to remember how to use their sextant and watch to do a running fix.
So this brings me to my question: are there any standards in place that mandate that professional navigators (either with the Navy or the merchant marine) take some specified number of sights per month...that they take concrete steps to retain their proficiency in celestial nav?
A second aspect of this question relates to recreational sailors. Is it your hunch that X% of small boat sailors use a sextant regularly enough that we can say they have retained what they learned to get their USCG/CYA certification?
If the answer to that is "yes", then how big a proportion is represented by "X%"?
Thanks,
Bob
From: Edmonton, Canada
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David Burch
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posted October 07, 2014 12:58 PM
First i must say that cel nav is not difficult; once you learn how to do it and take a few sights, you could easily put it away for a long time and then do it when needed.
You might not get as accurate a fix after not doing it for a year or so, but you would get plenty good a fix. The width of the sun is 32', half that is 16', and half that is 8'. very difficult to imagine not being able to line the sun up with the horizon to within a quarter of its diameter... in fact much better is far more likely even for the first time you ever use a sextant.
The paperwork can all be done with forms without knowing anything of the background.... if needed, and having practiced some in the past.
To my knowledge there is no USCG requirement for a fixed amount of practice on a regular basis once a license is in hand, though we know many responsible merchant officers who take pride in their knowledge and do take sights on a regular basis.
As for recreational sailors, again, responsible sailors also take pride in their skills and practice periodically. If i had to make a WAG estimate, it would be some 20% of sailors take sights once in a while for practice, and some 50% have studied cel nav at some point and could do the sights if needed. The remaining (WAG) 30% include the person you referred to.
Again, cel nav is far easier than coastal nav. It requires far less knowledge and far less skill. Learn it once and it will be the same years from now as it is now, and it will be the same in the middle of the Pacific as it is in the middle of the Persian Gulf. If you do not get it right the fist time, then do it all again. there is rarely any rush to process. Coastal nav, on the other hand, presents to the navigator a totally different set of circumstances on almost all navigation questions, often to be carried out in hazardous waters, with little room for error and little time to execute.
It is continual practice with inland and coastal nav that is far more important than regular practice with cel nav. the navigators who rely solely on GPS without learning the fundamentals of log and compass chart navigation are far more likely to get into trouble on inland waters than a sailor in the ocean.
the navy and merchant marine do have standard policies for regular practice on coastal nav, not to mention that it is also required by the Navigation Rules... at least in directly.
From: Starpath, Seattle, WA
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Bob Goethe
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posted October 08, 2014 08:17 AM
Thanks, David.
From: Edmonton, Canada
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