Dumb Question- Windscreen

[170C]

On my recent flight review the cfii had me do a trip of about 80 or so miles using a sectional & compass. I have to admit that I was a bit rusty since I had not been flying in some time and was not very familiar with the area in which we flew. Never hurts to practice once in a while since as we all know electronic devices can fail. Fortunately I don't have a VOR in my plane so I didn't have to demonstrate that I have likely forgotten how to use one of those either

[hilltop170]

......By that same reasoning, the Navy should still have sextants on board with people that know how to use them.

Back in the 1990s when I was still working for the oil company, I was allowed to make a sailing voyage on one of the company's super tankers from Valdez, Alaska to the Cherry Point Refinery at Bellingham, Washington. As a guest, I was given free range over the entire ship so I chose to spend at least one shift working in every work position on the ship from mopping floors with the lowest pay grade guys to the Captain (who was also a pilot). Working with the officers, every 1/2 hour, if I remember correctly, they plotted our position on a paper chart using the then operating Loran system as well as using celestial navigation whenever weather conditions allowed. The positions were plotted and then compared. Every officer knew how to use the sextant and was proficient with it.

If the Navy doesn't still regularly use sextants, I would be very surprised.

[bagarre]

The Naval Academy stopped requiring cadets to master the sextant around 1998 I leu of the more accurate GPS system.

[DaveF]

A compass mounted at the top of the windshield will help hold my sun shade in place. So it does have some utility.

[cessna170bdriver]

... and was not very familiar with the area in which we flew. ...

In the early 1980s a fellow from Ohio landed in Tullahoma where I was based (not too far from where Frank now lives) and proclaimed that due to the lack of section lines, anyone who could navigate with a chart and compass over Middle Tennessee could do so over open water.

[170C]

That was a pretty perceptive Ohioan It sure is different from many parts of TX Not many large fields around, but beautiful country.

Miles, refresh my memory, where were you working at the time Were you working at Huntsville or at Arnold

[hilltop170]

The Naval Academy stopped requiring cadets to master the sextant around 1998 in leu of the more accurate GPS system.

That is scary!

[bagarre]

We're really way off topic but I'd think it'd be scary if they still required Sextants.
Let's look at exactly how much of the WORLD relies on GPS. Not just the military but the whole world.
It's pretty staggering. It's everywhere. Why? Because it's rock solid and has enormous redundancy built in.
So if GPS was ever truly shut down, the whole world would come to a grinding halt.


Compass === useless.

[daedaluscan]

I agree that a compass is not a primary navigation tool anymore but it annoys me to have an instrument in my plane that is not working as it should.
I still fail to believe that every navy ship does not have a sextant in a box somewhere and someone who can use it. My high school buddy who was in the British navy (in his 50s now) is stunningly accurate with a sextant. I have however been wrong before.

[cessna170bdriver]

...Miles, refresh my memory, where were you working at the time Were you working at Huntsville or at Arnold

I was at Arnold.

[170C]

Best you come back

[bagarre]

I agree that a compass is not a primary navigation tool anymore but it annoys me to have an instrument in my plane that is not working as it should.
I still fail to believe that every navy ship does not have a sextant in a box somewhere and someone who can use it. My high school buddy who was in the British navy (in his 50s now) is stunningly accurate with a sextant. I have however been wrong before.

Even if they did had one onboard and an old salt that knew how to use it, what use would it be?
They could know their position plus or minus 5 miles.
They can't fire missiles <- GPS Guided
They can't launch aircraft <- GPS Guided
Drones? nope

That technology has gone the way of the stadimeter, log line, 16 inch guns and so should the compass as a required instrument.

[blueldr]

I have an old navigator friend from the Air Force that reports that accurrate use of a sextant requires an accurate time signal. The Naval academy was having such a hard time teaching the midshipmen to tell time that they just gave up on the whole system.

[bagarre]

I have an old navigator friend from the Air Force that reports that accurrate use of a sextant requires an accurate time signal. The Naval academy was having such a hard time teaching the midshipmen to tell time that they just gave up on the whole system.

Give a sailor a ball bearing and he'll either break it, paint it, lose it or get it pregnant.

[johneeb]

I agree that a compass is not a primary navigation tool anymore but it annoys me to have an instrument in my plane that is not working as it should.
I still fail to believe that every navy ship does not have a sextant in a box somewhere and someone who can use it. My high school buddy who was in the British navy (in his 50s now) is stunningly accurate with a sextant. I have however been wrong before.

Even if they did had one onboard and an old salt that knew how to use it, what use would it be?
They could know their position plus or minus 5 miles.
They can't fire missiles <- GPS Guided
They can't launch aircraft <- GPS Guided
Drones? nope

That technology has gone the way of the stadimeter, log line, 16 inch guns and so should the compass as a required instrument.

Here is an extract on from that august source of information Wikipedia Dictionary:

"The US Naval Academy announced that it was discontinuing its course on celestial navigation, considered to be one of its most demanding course, from the formal curriculum in the spring of 1998 stating that a sextant is accurate to a three-mile (5 km) radius, while a satellite-linked computer can pinpoint a ship within 60 feet (18 m) as long as the satellites are functioning correctly. Presently, midshipmen continue to learn to use the sextant, but instead of performing a tedious 22-step mathematical calculation to plot a ship's course, midshipmen feed the raw data into a computer." (I colored the font red because things happen pretty slowly when using celestial nav.)