RN Introduction

Introduction

This River Navigation, From Paper to PC book is intended to be a midlevel course in river navigation on inland rivers of the United States. It is suitable for instruction of the professional and the serious recreational cruiser. It assumes some basic knowledge assimilated through experience or prior training. References to basic information not contained here will be provided for those new to the subject as well as suggested further reading for those needing more in depth knowledge on a particular subject.

This book is based on over 50 years of experience in river navigation beginning with paper aerial photographic charts and now including modern electronic charts. The author has personal experience on the Alabama, Chattahoochee, Mississippi and Tennessee rivers as well as the Intracoastal Waterway, coastal and offshore work. The first marine navigational book he purchased is dated 1956. His grandfather gave him the book TRIGONOMETRY, SURVEYING and NAVIGATION published in 1093 and he has been studying the subject ever since getting that first navigation text. He has a United States Power Squadrons full educational certificate and is a certified instructor. He has taught courses from Basic Boating to Celestial Navigation and presented seminars on VHF communications and Radar. He holds both commercial and amateur extra FCC licenses and is a retired Lt. Col., Communications Information Systems Officer with 30 years experience in electronics maintenance, communications and radar from HF to UHF to Satellite. He was president of a Microsoft certified computer consulting company for a number of years and still does software development.

Captain Farmer is a current member of the Society of Naval Architects and Marine Engineers and a former member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers. He has authored previous books on Towboating (An Introduction to TOWBOATING and the Towing Industry, ISBN 978-0-578-09330-7 (c) 2011, available on Amazon) and a river guidebook (TENNESSEE RIVER GUIDE BOOK 2010) plus numerous presentations on  “The Anatomy of a Steam Riverboat” and “A Day in the Life of a Riverboat Captain”. These presentations have been at many local, district and national meetings.