Navigator

A navigator is the person on board a ship or aircraft responsible for its navigation.[1] The navigator's primary responsibility is to be aware of ship or aircraft position at all times. Responsibilities include planning the journey, advising the ship's captain or aircraft commander of estimated timing to destinations while en route, and ensuring hazards are avoided. The navigator is in charge of maintaining the aircraft or ship's nautical charts, nautical publications, and navigational equipment, and generally has responsibility for meteorological equipment and communications.

With the advent of GPS, the effort required to accurately determine one's position has decreased by orders of magnitude, so the entire field has experienced a revolutionary transition since the 1990s with traditional navigation tasks being used less frequently

Shipborne navigators in the U.S. Navy are normally surface warfare officer qualified with the exception of naval aviators and naval flight officers assigned to ship's navigator billets aboard aircraft carriers and large deck amphibious assault ships and who have been qualified at a level equal to surface warfare officers. U.S. Coast Guard officers that are shipboard navigators are normally cutter qualified at a level analogous to the USN officers previously mentioned. Quartermasters are the navigator's enlisted assistants and perform most of the technical navigation duties.

Aboard ships in the Merchant Marine and Merchant Navy, the second mate is generally the (senior) navigator.