NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Loran-C
From: Jeremy C
Date: 2009 Mar 19, 07:52 -0700
From: Jeremy C
Date: 2009 Mar 19, 07:52 -0700
Just as the VOR/DME stations were re-purposed for LAAS, so were most of the coastal RDF stations converted to DGPS transmitters. There are no US based RDF stations around to my knowledge and I am fairly certain that all of the foriegn long-range RDF stations are also shut down (QRT). This is not to say that North Korea or other Communist states don't maintain some short range stations (they also still keep Morse code watch), but generally RDF went the way of Omega. Until this past year ships needed excemption certificate so that they could legally no carry RDF equipment. Now, you just don't need anything at all. Along a similar line, a couple of years ago the USCG removed all RDF questions from their Ocean Merchant Marine exams, which typically lags the industry by several years. The last, and only, time I saw a working RDF on a ship was in 1998 on my training ship. I tried using it, but all I could pick up were commercial broadcast stations. The end result is that outside of pilotage you now have GPS, LORAN-C (with its limited range), and Celestial. If the USCG is right, we may be down to GPS and Celestial in the near future. Jeremy --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Navigation List archive: www.fer3.com/arc To post, email NavList@fer3.com To , email NavList-@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
