NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
Re: Loran-C
From: Lu Abel
Date: 2009 Mar 23, 21:00 -0700
From: Lu Abel
Date: 2009 Mar 23, 21:00 -0700
This month's GPS World magazine has an interesting article on what's happening with Loran-C. The recently updated Federal Radio Navigation Plan, a document jointly created by the departments of Homeland Security and Defense and the Federal Aviation Administration calls for phasing out of Loran-C. It also calls for moving responsibility for Loran from the Coast Guard to a different part of DHS. The call to preserve Loran-C, which motivated not only the preservation of the system but a call to create e-Loran was the result of an Institute of Defense Analysis study which pointed out the vulnerabilities of GPS for both military and especially civilian use and called for creation of a second high precision navigation system using totally separate technology. I would see this as especially important to the FAA, since a whole bunch of challenges to aircraft navigation (especially so-called zero-zero landings) can be solved with precision navigation tools -- but it's pretty scary to think of your airplane on final approach under zero-visibility conditions into a major airport when somebody's TV decides to go on the blink and jam GPS, so I'm really surprised the FAA is accepting this call for eliminating e-Loran. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Navigation List archive: www.fer3.com/arc To post, email NavList@fer3.com To , email NavList-@fer3.com -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---