GPS Availability During Increased Sunspot activity

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Malabar

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The MCA have just issued MIN 453 which addresses the effect that the current round of increased sunspot activity is likely to have on Satnav systems. All in all an unusually readable missive from the MCA which will be of interest to all those who take their navigation seriously.
 
http://www.dft.gov.uk/mca/453_solar_activity.pdf
It seems to suggest that outages will only be for a few minutes at most, mostly it will just be a loss of accuracy.
Probably not a problem for yotties who started navigating without GPS, more of an issue for AIS users who need to know where a ship is to within 10m or so.
It's a bit late to be touting Glonass as a cure for a problem that will peak next month...
 
lw395 said:
http://www.dft.gov.uk/mca/453_solar_activity.pdf
It seems to suggest that outages will only be for a few minutes at most, mostly it will just be a loss of accuracy.
Probably not a problem for yotties who started navigating without GPS, more of an issue for AIS users who need to know where a ship is to within 10m or so.
It's a bit late to be touting Glonass as a cure for a problem that will peak next month...
Click to expand...

Hmmm if your relying on your AIS for 10m you are doing something wrong. Even on big ships if they are rolling all those ariels perched up the mast or on top if the bridge if the ship is rolling could easily be moving 5-10m before you start...

Depends on how the GPS decides to jump, fun things could still happen though...
 
At present, during "Joint Warrior" war games being conducted off the north-west coast of Scotland, GPS is being jammed over huge sea areas. Areas effected are The Minch, The Little Minch, the Sound of Raasay, and the Inner Sound. Also an area of 40 nautical miles radius around Faraid Head. Aren't we lucky? We don't have to wait for sun spots.:mad:
 
onesea said:
Hmmm if your relying on your AIS for 10m you are doing something wrong. Even on big ships if they are rolling all those ariels perched up the mast or on top if the bridge if the ship is rolling could easily be moving 5-10m before you start...

Depends on how the GPS decides to jump, fun things could still happen though...
Click to expand...

If you read the link, you might see that the 10m requirement is something the MCA sets a bit of store on.....
 
Malabar said:
The MCA have just issued MIN 453 which addresses the effect that the current round of increased sunspot activity is likely to have on Satnav systems. All in all an unusually readable missive from the MCA which will be of interest to all those who take their navigation seriously.
Click to expand...

The solar maximum expected this year seems to be significantly lower than the last maximum in 2001-2, which itself was lower than the 1990-91 maximum. The sun seems to be going through a quiet spell. I don't know how much consumer-grade GPS stuff was out there in 1991, but there must have been plenty in 2001 and I don't recall there being too many problems then.
 
AMCD300 said:
Try 'Space Weather' dot com...lots of information in the links relating to radio propagation and GPS accuracy. The skill is in interpretation for your needs.

http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/SWN/index.html

Andy
Click to expand...

Yep - click on the "Solar cycle progression" charts on the lower right of that page to see how small the current peak in solar activity is looking compared to the last one.
 
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