UK 'over-reliant' on GPS signals

[koenig]

This is a good example of some over educated "smart" person not really thinking for the real world. Book smarts vs street and no real world experience. I work in mining. We use gps to mark our drilling locations. Similar to oil exploration. Like that industry that technology is not our only aid to find the material we are seeking. I also fly airplanes, my Fathers second hobby, first being boating and fishing. Father was a naval bridge officer. With flying, I've been flying in and taking the controls since I was about 10 years old. I'm 38 and have had private pilots since 16. I fly instrument flight rules. By doing so I can fly a plane with aid of instruments and other tools blind, including GPS. By following IFR, I can loose an aid or two and still fly blind. Air traffic control is also still a mixture of radar, radio communication, etcetera. We lose GPS or a terrorist hacks it--well since in my industry and hobbies I rely on other aids that confirm what the other are saying. Two Uncles are employed as BC Ferry Officers, one is a navigator (over 30 years in this job and recently retired) and the other is a mate (also over 30 years in service). Its fun for me to ride our public ferry transit system because I get invited on the bridge. Both are on the newest in the Ferry fleet, launched in 2008. 160 m length 28.2 m beam, 1,650 passengers and 370 vehicles. This one:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MV_Coastal_Renaissance

The Uncle who is a mate on the above has his capt ticket as well. He has turned down being Captain of that very boat. Captains are not crew and cant be in the union, so uncle makes more $$$. His previous ferry was on another vessel launched in 1993. He started in 1969 and worked his way up. Most of the crew are old timers. Despite the Renaissance being modern with the latest technology. Its still operated with a mixture of aids old and proven with complete modern GPS push button computer preset automation of everything. But like all good mariners or aircraft pilots, one aid is not used in navigation, rather a mixture of aids, that together makes operation, smooth, efficient and safe. If the smart theorists saw the big picture and how all the GPS users actually use it. They'd see that in the real world its only a small aid to how these industries operate with it. We can find oil without it, planes don't need it, neither does air traffic control and ships still navigate with all the other aids to operation as well. So the GPS doom and gloom theory is just way wrong!!!!!!!

 

[Conachair]

This is a good example of some over educated "smart" person not really thinking for the real world. .....


They'd see that in the real world its only a small aid to how these industries operate with it. We can find oil without it, planes don't need it, neither does air traffic control and ships still navigate with all the other aids to operation as well. So the GPS doom and gloom theory is just way wrong!!!!!!!

Read the report.

http://www.raeng.org.uk/news/publications/list/reports/Global_Navigation_Systems.pdf

but the use of GPS
signals is now commonplace in data networks, financial systems, shipping and air
transport systems, agriculture, railways and emergency services. Safety of life
applications are becoming more common. One consequence is that a surprising
number of different systems already have GPS as a shared dependency, so a
failure of the GPS signal could cause the simultaneous failure of many services
that are probably expected to be independent of each other.

I had a quick flick through but didn't see any of the uses you highlight mentioned. Other uses were sited...

3.1 Some critical applications of GNSS
In road transport, emergency vehicle location, dispatch and navigation require
medium availability and accuracy. Future applications such as automated
highways and lane control will need very high availability, integrity and accuracy.
In aviation, search and rescue already uses GNSS, and control of the movement of
aircraft and other vehicles on airports and precision landing approaches are
being considered.
Safety of Life maritime applications include search and rescue, synchronisation of
flashing navigational aids, and navigation in crowded waterways under low
visibility conditions.
The Rail Safety and Standards Board forecasts that GNSS will be in use this decade
for railway signalling and train movement control and monitoring.
The police use GNSS for tracking suspects and generating evidence to use in
prosecutions and for situational awareness for armed response units.

Maybe the smart persons live more in the real world than you think...

 

[koenig]

The thing is not one industry listed are solely reliant on GPS. The article mentions how jamming GPS could cause ships to hit rocks. Yes, if GPS was the sole tool used. But its not, even on the most advanced ships. The smart book and theory experts obviously did not go out in the real world to see how GPS is used and thats with the aid of other tools. For even a very modern launched in 2009 ship, GPS is not the sole means of fixing their position while under way!

 

[Conachair]

The thing is not one industry listed are solely reliant on GPS. The article mentions how jamming GPS could cause ships to hit rocks. Yes, if GPS was the sole tool used. But its not, even on the most advanced ships. The smart book and theory experts obviously did not go out in the real world to see how GPS is used and thats with the aid of other tools. For even a very modern launched in 2009 ship, GPS is not the sole means of fixing their position while under way!

Did you even open the report? The only place mentioning rocks is the daily mail which has little or no connection with the real world.
If you're having a rant about how science is portrayed in the media then I completly agree, it's way off the mark.

But it seems if gps went off tomorrow it would be chaos in a lot of areas, no one even knows how many systems use it for timing and how all these system might interact.

And boats don't just use it for positioning.

The trial was conducted over several days during April 2008 at Flamborough
Head on the East coast of the United Kingdom. DSTL provided a professional lowto-
medium power jammer, which was controlled remotely by two VHF
transceivers and transmitted a known pseudo-random noise code over the
civilian L1 frequency providing a jamming signal over the whole 2MHz
bandwidth of L1. Although the unit was capable of broadcasting on the P code,
this was not activated. The total power of the signal over the 2MHz bandwidth
was approximately 2dBW (~1.5W) of power.
The Coverage area of the GPS jamming unit at 25m above ground level on
maximum power of 1.58W ERP is shown in the figure below (Image courtesy of
DSTL).
For the dynamic trials, the Northern Lighthouse Board vessel NLV Pole Star steered
a course back and forth between two waypoints on a path that dissected both
the main lobe of the GPS jammer and the two side lobes, but with sufficient
length beyond the jamming region to enable the various GPS enabled units to
reacquire satellites.
The crew of Pole Star was fully briefed prior to the trial and so expecting GPSenabled
systems to fail.
Global Navigation Space Systems: reliance and vulnerabilities 41
Annex D
When Pole Star entered the jamming zone, numerous alarms sounded on the
bridge over a period of approximately 10 minutes. These alarms were all linked to
the failure of different functions to acquire and calculate their GPS position, which
included: the vessel’s DGPS receivers, the AIS transponder, the dynamic
positioning system, the ship’s gyro calibration system and the digital selective
calling system. The crew of the Pole Star was able to recognise each alarm and
silence them but they were expecting the alarms to sound. In the situation where
a crew was not expecting this level of system failure then the distraction caused
by so many alarms sounding at once could have had a significant effect. The
effect could be made worse depending on the time of day (potentially a vessel’s
bridge can be single-manned at night, or with one officer and a look-out) or if the
vessel is performing a manoeuvre or operation demanding high accuracy and a
high degree of human concentration at the time of GPS failure, such as docking
in poor visibility.
Some vessels have integrated bridge systems, which enable automatic execution
of a passage plan on autopilot. If this system is operating at a time that jamming
occurs, then the vessel’s course and heading may change without informing the
crew, potentially leading to extremely hazardous consequences.
Although the Pole Star’s crew was expecting GPS failure, problems were
experienced. The vessel’s Electronic Chart Display & Information System (ECDIS)
was not updated due to the failure of the GPS input, resulting in a static screen.
ECDIS is the normal mode of positioning on board Pole Star (with paper chart
backup,) and during the periods of jamming some crew members became
frustrated when trying to look at the ECDIS. This resulted in the monitor being
switched off!
There are several questions raised by this trial, such as the ability of a vessel’s crew
to quickly revert to traditional means of navigation and also the extent to which
they are able to navigate with these means. Given the greater reliance on satellite
navigation, in particular GPS, these skills are not being used daily and are no
longer second nature. This trial also raised awareness of the number of alarms
that can sound on the bridge and how the sheer quantity can be distracting.

 

[koenig]

I'm going by a conversation while on the bridge of a modern large passenger ferry. The main point of that test is how fast the crew could switch to old fashioned methods of navigation. I'll concede that people are overly reliant on new technology.

 

[AndrewB]

What I don't understand about this is that GPS outage is not uncommon at present. I have logged 6 occasions in the last 5 years when we lost reception - all three of my GPS receivers simultaneously, and (on 2 occasions when I could check) that of neighbouring boats as well. Typically this happens for a period of 10-15 minutes and has occurred inland as well as in deep ocean. No idea whether this is jamming, poor satellite configuration, Uncle Sam keeping us on our toes, or whatever.

But if this happens and the report is correct, why aren't there regular occurences of traffic chaos, aircraft crashing, ships on the rocks etc etc as a result? As Koenig says, somehow we cope.