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Peter Fogg wrote:

> An American called Martin Creamer has sailed a yacht around the globe
> without using any navigational instruments. As to when: best clue is my
> memory that the story appeared in the first issue of the magazine 'Ocean
> Navigator'. Seventies?

I don't think ON was started until the late '80s.

> More than anything else I think it was a mental challenge in slow motion. He
> spent months thinking about what he saw as his biggest problem: getting
> around Cape Horn. The specific problem was how narrow the strait is, and the
> imprecise nature of alternative methods of navigation used. Too far north
> and he risked the traditional hazard of running into the southern tip of
> South America: the complex mess of islands with perverse currents and tides
> swirling around them, the whole swept with catatonic winds, often with very
> deep water right up to the shore. Too far south and not only might the
> weather get even worse but the risk of meeting icebergs became exponentially
> greater. Not that far away is the most northern peninsula of Antarctica.

(I'm going to skip Peter's remaining description of Creamer's navigation)

As I recollect, Creamer chose to round the Horn at a very specific time
of year when a major celestial body (maybe the sun itself, I can't
remember) was barely above the horizon at his desired latitude.  He
sailed south until he saw the body on the horizon and then sailed east.

What strikes me about Creamer's effort, though, was the tremendous
amount of off-boat astronomical science and calculation that was
necessary for his effort.

While the thought of being out in the middle of the ocean with no really
good way to determine my position is truly frightening, is it fair to
say Creamer's voyage was "instrument-less" when it was subject to a heck
of a lot of pre-planning using instruments and computers?

I'm not at all trying to put down Creamer's accomplishment -- it was
stunning.

What I am trying to do is to provoke some thought.  Some on this list
might say celestial navigation is "traditional" and "electronics free."

Is that really true when I take a sight, glance at my electronic watch
to get the time, look up body information in my computer-generated
nautical almanac and, eschewing sight reduction using a pocket
calculator, instead do "traditional" sight reduction using
computer-generated tables?

Lu Abel

   

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