Pilotage and dead reckoning
Navigating by landmarks and by clock-compass-chart, and when each fails.
14 min read · Navigation
After this lesson you can
- Explain the difference between pilotage and dead reckoning, and why cross-country pilots use both together.
- Convert a true course into a compass heading through the full variation-and-deviation chain.
- Pick landmarks that hold up as checkpoints, and keep a flight log that tells you the truth in the air.
- Work through a lost-position sequence without making the situation worse.
Two techniques carry almost all of VFR cross-country flying. Pilotage means finding your position by matching what you see out the window to what is printed on the chart: rivers, railroads, towns, coastlines. Dead reckoning means computing where you should be, from a heading, a true airspeed, a wind, and a clock, without looking outside at all. Neither one is complete by itself.
A GPS moving map has made both of these look old-fashioned, but it has not made them optional. The day the screen goes dark, blanks, or quietly shows the wrong position, a pilot who has been tracking a chart and a clock knows where they are within seconds. A pilot who has only been following a magenta line does not.
The rest of this lesson
- 1.Two ways to know where you are
- 2.From true course to compass heading
- 3.A full worked example: Chickasha to Guthrie
- 4.Choosing checkpoints that actually work
- 5.Keeping a flight log in the air
- 6.Checking airspace and terrain before you go
- 7.If you are not sure where you are
- 8.Head-down time: the cost of navigating by looking inside
- 9.True airspeed, density altitude, and the power setting you choose
These 9 sections, their figures, the checks along the way and the end-of-lesson quiz come with the PPL track. Paid once, yours for good.
Key terms
Try to recall each definition before turning the card.