Hello, ladies and gents,

Has I went to the library and looked (out of boredom) the entire 14 CFR on microfiches, I stumbled upon an interesting certificate that I had only heard rumors about. The Navigator, or flight Navigator, whichever it might be.
Now this thing is by far, the hardest one to get when you look at the required task to study, and thus demonstrate.
Of course nowadays with the advent of such tecnologies as GPS, Rnav, INS, etc... Even on transatlantic flights no one actually breaks out a sextant out of a flight bag to measure star inclinations and calculate positions.
Nonetheless, does any of you ever met or knows someone who knows someone, who has held such a certificate?
If that is the case, we all out to take a field trip and go bow to this living God, just look up how hard this thing is and you will understand why I would want to go pay my respect to such an individual.

Please post, as futile as the answer might be, I am eager to hear from you all.

Harmattan 96:

Indeed, the Navigator rating is a difficult rating to achieve.

Many of my college classmates went on to become Nav's in the USAF, while others of us went to Pilot Training.After graduation from Nav School the new Nav's either went into transports, tankers, etc doing basic navigation and star shots with the sextants, OR they went on for more training as EWO's, Bomb Nav's or WSO's in bomber/fighter aircraft.

Many USAF aircraft carried pure Nav's for years until most of them were replaced by INS/IRS/GPS nav devices.

Today, some USAF/Navy aircraft still carry "navigators"-they are the legacy EWO's, WSO's and RIO's that operate fire control systems, ECM gear, etc.

To my knowledge, US airlines have not had Navigators for eons! We have used doppler radar, INS/IRS/GPS nav systems for a very long time. I cannot speak to the use of Navigators by foreign airlines, but with the advent of today's glass airplanes, it kinda obviates the need for them. B)