NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: John Brown
Date: 2015 Sep 1, 15:20 -0700
Nevill Partidge wrote:
I was on a cruise recently and had a conversation with the first mate who confirmed that they no longer use the sextant (all satelite now) and have stopped teaching practical navigation in marine schools. Not sure how true that is.
I'm completely out of touch with navigation teaching for professional mariners in the UK but it seems that celestial navigation still features in the syllabus for deck officers in the UK and under the International Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping (STCW) for merchant seamen - PDF attached.
Competence in basic Celestial Navigation is also a requirement for the UK Maritime and Coastguard/Royal Yachting Association qualification of Ocean Yachtmaster.
It doesn't look as though these requirements are going to change any time soon.
Regards
John
