The termgun deck used to refer to adeck aboard aship that was primarily used for the mounting ofcannon to be fired inbroadsides. The term is generally applied to decks enclosed under a roof; smaller andunrated vessels carried their guns on theupper deck,forecastle andquarterdeck, and these were not described as gun decks.[1][2]
The term "gun decking" is also naval slang for fabricating or falsifying something. A possible explanation relates tomidshipmen retiring to the gun deck to complete theircelestial navigation assignments of computing the ship's position three times daily following morningstar sights, noon sun line, and evening star sights. While some midshipmen might be conscientious about computing positions from new observations, others were reputed toextrapolate and back calculate observation data fromdead reckoning courses and speeds since earlier observations, and the computations performed on the gun deck were suspect.[2][3]
This term is now used to indicate the falsification of documentation in order to avoid doing the work or make present conditions seem otherwise acceptable.[3]
In the modern Navy falsifying reports, records and the like is often referred to as 'gundecking.'
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