Anyone on here ever a navigator? (Airplane not boat)

I am getting ready to go back into the AF with a commision and they are trying to talk me into being a navigator because of my very high scores and degree (EE).

What does a navigator do, besides the obvious? Do they just plot a course and go for the ride or do they do things in flight? Are there navigators in the 2 seater fighter planes like the double seat F-18’s and F-14’s? If so, what do they do? Do they have additional responsibilities during combat? I am sure they do, but I really don’t know what they have to do? How difficult is the job?

Honestly the idea of being a navigator is appealing to me right now but I would like to know more about it if anyone knows anything about what they do exactly? I know this sounds like a silly question coming from someone who was in the AF before, but I really don’t konw what a navigator does?

I haven’t a real big clue on what a Navigator does, but thanks for going back in! My knowledge of backseaters goes way back into the technological stone age, but they were called Weapons Systems Officers at one point, I believe, so they may do targeting and intercepts if tactical.

Are you sure you were in the Air Force? The F-14 and F-18 are both Navy/Marine birds (and few F-18s have nore than one seat).

I can’t offer you a personal view of the navigator’s job (or that of the three-headed-monster), however, the USAF has a site that provides some information. (Most of it is boilerplate “Here is where you can get promoted from this job” stuff.)

They are using frames, so linking directly to the pages you want, is a bit of work (I will try it below) but if you go to
http://www.afpc.randolph.af.mil/
and click on Rated in the left frame, it will take you to the Career Path for officers.

From there, scroll down a bit to Introduction to Navigator. The various types of navigator/electronic warfare officer positions each have links below that.

Airlift Navigator
Bomber Nav/Weapon Systems Officer (WSO)/Electronic Warfare Officer (EWO)
Fighter Weapons Systems Officer (WSO)/Electronic Warfare Officer (EWO)
Recce/Airlift Electronic Warfare Officer (EWO)
Recce/Tanker Navigator
Test Navigator/Weapon System Officer (WSO)
Special Operations Forces (SOF) Navigator/Electronic Warfare Officer (EWO)

Yeah, I don’t know crap about planes to be honest. The only ones I worked around on a regular basis were F-16s and 15s. I know those are Navy jets, but I was just wondering in general. I just threw those out for an example. There are 2 seater 16s, but those are all just trainers as far as I know.

You sure you wouldn’t be a navigator in something like a B-52 or a C-5? I don’t think there are any 2-seat aircraft with a position of ‘navigator’.

You sure you wouldn’t be a navigator in something like a B-52 or a C-5? I don’t think there are any 2-seat aircraft with a position of ‘navigator’.

The navigator tells the pilot where to go. :smiley:

Sam, according to the USAF site, they are putting WSO and EWO types under the “navigator” heading. This would include the three headed monster carried by the two-seat F-15D.

I suspect that all planes have GPS navigation installed. It seems to me that the powers that be would be remiss if they didn’t.

And larger planes, like B-52 probably still carry an inertial platform for navigation.

For a long time the Navy used TACAN which is a secure version of OMNI range (VOR) navigation.
I suppose that those with a navigator rating do get some celestial navigation, you know sextant and clock and all that stuff. However, I would be surprised if redundant satellite or other electronic navigations systems aren’t installed so other forms of navigation probably don’t get used too much. However, it is nice to have a navigator who knows the old fashioned way just in case the electronic whiz-bangs go whizzzzzzz - bang.

I’d guess that the ‘navigator’ today is probably more of a computer operator, running the various systems on the plane that do things like threat monitoring, communication with various other intel assets, dialing in frequencies for various uses, etc. ‘Navigation’ most likely involves programming the inertial nav and GPS systems.

That’s starting to describe even how private pilots ‘navigate’. Punch some numbers into the GPS, slave the autopilot to it, and sit back and watch the scenery.

:stuck_out_tongue: [sup]He makes the coffee.[/sup]

I’m a nav for the Navy, so I can’t speak much for the AF. I believe the only tactical navs the AF has is in their F-15 2-seaters. There are plenty of HVAA (high value air asset, e.g., the EC-130, RC-135, etc) navs which are stand-off and rarely in a tactical environment. The Navy has tactical navs in the F-14 and EA-6B (3 of them), although they aren’t labeled as such. In the 14 it’s called a RIO (radar intercept officer) and in the prowler it’s called an ECMO (electronic countermeasures officer). The job is pretty varied from platform to platform, and even within a platform.

On a HVAA, you’ll probably progress from being a true nav (filing the flight plan, getting the many forecasts, programming the gps/inertials, plotting the course on a chart, taking ‘fixes’ along the way and telling the pilots where to steer to either get back on or stay on track, talking to ATC, keeping track of weather and gas (very important in the middle of the pacific)), to actually running recon or electronic warfare (jamming) missions, depending on the platform. No matter what you’re doing, you’re usually fairly busy, especially when things out of the ordinary start happening, like an intercept from a hostile country, in-flight emergency, in-flight rerouting, winds which are much higher than forecast, search-and-rescue.

The tactical-type navs in the prowler and tomcat are more focused on radar intercepts, bomb-run stuff, handling all the comms, and monitoring the electronic environment for targeting radars. Also, they have an extra pair of eyes to keep outside the cockpit to check for other air traffic and bad guy position for dogfights.

Almost all navs keep an official log of some sort or another when the plan is up in the air. This also helps to keep you busy.

FWIW, I’ve spoken to many AF navs, and they all say the same thing. The navs in the AF aren’t as well-respected as in the Navy. This isn’t to say the navs aren’t always below the pilots on the food chain in the Navy, but from what I understand, in the AF the navs get almost no respect at all for what they do. The saddest thing is that the AF navs don’t even get a bonus. The navs in the navy get a nice bonus. This may have changed very recently, though, so I’d check on it if you plan on staying in beyond your initial obligation. Also, flight pay is good thing.

Navs do not, fortunately, make coffee for people. :slight_smile:

Hope this helps.

Dave Simmons, I had a small chuckle reading your cel nav comment. I have very bad memories of it. Cel nav was quite a bitch to learn, and rarely used, which makes it difficult to keep proficient in it. Nowadays, I’m pretty sure they’ve either really scaled back the cel nav syllabus to just doing simple heading checks (still a pain in the ass, but much easier than actually obtaining a cel fix), or they may have dropped cel altogether. You’re right, cel is a nice back-up. But when you’re in a pinch, having a nav who’s so rusty he’s guessing at the procedure is just as good as having no nav at all.

Also, just to nitpick, TACAN is not a secure VOR. VOR is range only. TACAN, which is unesecure, provides both range and azimuth, letting you obtain a fix with one reading from a single station (i.e., getting a reading of "270 degrees at 40 miles from X station). With VOR, you need to stations for a rough fix, three for a solid fix. The only secure nav stuff we had (besides comms) was the GPS, which used to be encrypted.

I can vouch for flyboy’s comments on AF navs. Until recently, I was a civilian in AF Special Ops, and the navs often griped about their status vs pilots. Bonus, Promotion and Job selection were issues. BUT, they provide a vital service by guiding the aircraft into places where nobody with any sense would go.

I certainly agree. When I was in the army the pecking order was quite strict. After a battery of tests at pre-flight school cadets were classified as pilot, bombardier (obsolete MOS), or navigator. Those not classified as “pilot” seemed to feel a sense of lacking something. In operational outfits the order was pilot, co-pilot followed by everyone else.

You’re probably right. We never had any celestial navigation relying on dead reckoning, radio range and later on in the ETO GEE navigation. After you had become accustomed to GEE it was hard to force yourself to keep a rough track of where you were so you could get home if the GEE was out or damaged. Of course as long as you had a magnetic compass you could just head west. After you got to France there were so many airfields around that you were bound to find one pretty quickly.

I stand corrected.