What Happens If Satnav fails?

[Degema]

I have to agree with Darren and disagree to an extent with pward regarding the threat to marine navigation systems.

Sadly, with the decline in standards of training and consequent loss of "traditional" skills at sea (not to mention the withdrawal for cost reasons of alternative radio navaids), the scenario Darren mentions is all to likely.

With a well-trained ship's Bridge Management Team, each member is cross-checking the other in confined waters and all navaids are checked against each other and the Mk1 Eyeball. However, such well trained teams are few and far between and found in the main in reputable shipping companies only which make up a small percentage of the shipping industry. An awful lot of ships officers rely solely on what they can see on their GPS equipment............

[Darren]

And this New Scientist article describes the effects of an inadvertent jamming of radio by a US Warship, docked in San Diego in 2007.

It demonstrates just how far reaching is our reliance on GPS has become and the impact of a loss of service. The problems caused in that example are just a small fraction of the issues we'd face if there was a wider outage and it raises the issue of GPS jammer availability again.

There is news that the FCC (US equivalent of OfCom) is raising awareness of the illegality of jammers, be they cellphone or GPS and has an operation under way to identify and prosecute users. It's calling on members of the public to report abuse.

Anyone using or thinking of using a GPS jammer in the UK would do well to consider the law which has a maximum term of two years jail under the Wireless Telegraphy Act.
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Darren Griffin

[BigPerk]

Having seen quite an interesting Horizon programme (NO not 'program' Mr US Spellchecker ) recently about Cyber Attacks, where a nuclear power installation was attacked in an attempt to make a vital controller malfunction, I wonder how well protected the GPS systems are against determined software attacks by large 'software-savvy',well organised, and well funded international criminal agencies.
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David
(Navigon 70 Live, Nuvi 360)

[Darren]

That'll be the Stuxnet virus, targeted at Iranian Nuclear Power Stations and more specifically some Siemens kit installed in them.

All the ground control for NAVSTAR comes under the remit of US DoD but that's not to say it's impregnable.
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Darren Griffin

[BigPerk]

Hopefully Galileo is being similarly looked after (And that the DoD can make sure Wikileaks can't get in!)
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David
(Navigon 70 Live, Nuvi 360)

[dogdays]

One of the issues is that many boats no longer have plain RADAR, they have ploters that use GPS charting and use the RADAR input to show other boats in the area. Heading, track through the water, ETA, and the course to stear are all on the GPS system. Alas no GPS, no chart on the display.
We have all got lazy and do not wish to do the job by the traditional methods of navigation

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