
NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: sextant without paper charts
From: Scott Owen
Date: 2008 Oct 31, 22:17 -0500
From: Scott Owen
Date: 2008 Oct 31, 22:17 -0500
frankreed@HistoricalAtlas.net wrote: > I have been aboard a nuclear submarine (when I was a kid, as a guest of a > friend's dad), and there's plenty of spare space for sight reduction tables, > even on an attack sub. Of course, space is still something that you don't > want to waste, so to me it would make sense to teach the tables in the > Nautical Almanac, rather than HO229, for that very improbable emergency > --but definitely possible emergency-- where you need to navigate by sextant > and stars. Frank, QMs learn sight reduction using HO229, NA, and calculator methods. How often they practice celnav would be entirely up the the ships navigator and Captain. Call me crazy but it seems to me if you learn the methods you'd have the capability to be able to do them all. So now we are back to the method of carry of those pubs which I will not repeat here. > Hey, I've got a question regarding naval practice with respect to celestial > navigation: when are they required to carry the almanac for the following > year? A nuclear sub can remain at sea for a very long time and in war-time, > it wouldn't be too hard to imagine staying away so long that you run past > December 31st. Is there a rule? Not sure it's a rule but I think I can answer it. IIRC, the NA comes out every year around Oct or Nov from the USNO. The USNO has a "distribution list" to mail a copy to all naval commands [ships, subs, shore facilities] that are required or want to have a copy. If a Naval vessel is "deployed" before the issuance of the NA and is not in port before Dec 31 the vessel will receive it via mail at sea or via mail at the first available port where mail is received after Dec 31. Ships do receive regular mail at sea including letters/packages from home and new publications covering expired publications. The prudent ship/sub navigator will let USNO know they will be deployed during reissuance and have them send it to them first to allow for the anticipated lag time in receiving mail at sea. Lu, they have email at sea in the 21st Century and even back in the old 20th Century but it's not unheard of to shut it off... another old adage, loose lips sink ships still applies. I could give you the technical details on how email at sea works but I am disinclined to do so. --Scott > And you added: > "I believe I did include calculators but..." > > Yes, you did. 'Nuff said. > > -FER > --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Navigation List archive: www.fer3.com/arc To post, email NavList@fer3.com To unsubscribe, email NavList-unsubscribe@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---