Definition
A handheld flight planning tool — either a mechanical circular slide rule (commonly called an E6B) or an electronic equivalent — used by pilots to solve flight problems such as true airspeed, density altitude, wind correction, fuel burn, time, speed, distance, and unit conversions.
Plain English
A small calculator built specifically for pilots. It works out the numbers a pilot needs for flight planning, like how fast the airplane is really moving through the air, how much fuel a leg will burn, and how to correct for wind.
Context Anchor
Seen in preflight planning and performance calculations, including the effect of nonstandard pressure and temperature on aircraft performance.
Derivation
‘Navigation’ comes from the Latin navigare, meaning to sail or steer a ship. ‘Computer’ originally meant any device or person that performs calculations, long before it meant an electronic machine. So a navigation computer is simply a calculating device built for the job of steering an aircraft — a useful reminder that the original E6B is a purely mechanical tool, not a digital one.
Why Pilots Care
Correct calculations prevent navigation errors, fuel misjudgments, and deviations from intended flight paths.
Intuition Check
Do not assume a navigation computer must be an electronic screen or GPS unit. In this FAA context, it can be a hand-held flight calculator or a manual circular slide-rule tool used to work out flight-planning numbers.
Example Sentence 1
Before the cross-country flight, she used her navigation computer to calculate true airspeed and the wind correction angle for each leg.
Example Sentence 2
Using the navigation computer, she quickly found the heading needed to stay on course despite the crosswind.