Second Officer
Master of charts
Who, what, where
Following the Captain and the Chief Officer the second officer is next the in line of command of sailing a ship.
They're in charge of the navigation watch from 00:00 to 04:00 and 12:00 to 16:00 ST when the ship is sailing or at anchor. During the watch the second mate is obviously in charge of the navigation, avoiding traffic, adjusting sails and keeping an eye on the general goings ons on the ship.
Outside of watch keeping they are also the person that is in charge of the navigational charts, keeping them clean and organised, keeping them updated, replacing them when needed, planning the route and keeping track of the route during the voyage. Usually they are the person who'll supply the captain with the information for the Captain's log.
In addition they also take care of all the communication equipment. VHF and MF/HF radios, signal flags, semaphores. And the checking of equipment such as GPS receivers, RADAR and the like.
Known second mates
When the Pirate crew was sailing with the Narwhal, Rose at one point became their second officer. Before her they didn't have an appointed person for that position as the boat was quite small and they hardly sailed long enough to warrant a full watch system. But after some notable actions on her part she was rewarded with the promotion by the crew.
After the crew split up and started sailing with the Sunset Dawn, Rose moved on to become captain, and Marshmallow was voted to take on the job of second mate for her.
"Marshmallow What did you do with the radars?" Jan de Jongh asked, surprised. "Why...? I just adjusted the settings a bit chief." Marsh answered reluctantly. "Because the image looks way better than I've ever seen it before. Much sharper, and more details!" Jan explained.
They have a lot more responsibilities than I realised. I didn't know that they were basically in charge of all the maps and charts.
Explore Etrea | March of 31 Tales
Some one has to do it :P