In the wake of last month’s Expert Advice column on eLoran — “The Low Cost of Protecting America” by Dana Goward of the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation — come several positive comments and encouraging developments. Rather than rehearse all the arguments why we should care about this, I’ll repeat the one word that I heard most often in GNSS circles in 2013: jamming. Followed closely by: spoofing.
“I have been advocating strongly for reconsideration of the government’s domestic Loran decision for the last year or so,” writes one reader positioned on Washington’s Beltway, “and specifically working within the Department of Defense (DoD) to ensure it is aware of international developments for eLoran in the UK and South Korea, and the possibilities inherent in other former Loran chains.
“The DoD is beginning to recognize the value of eLoran as a complement to GPS, not only for international missions, but in cooperation with the departments of Transportation and Homeland Security for domestic critical infrastructure.”
Last fall, Don Jewell’s Defense PNT newsletter on the same subject drew this reply from another well-known expert:
“One of the key short-term actions is to prevent the decommissioned [Loran] sites from being sold off for subdivisions. These sites are a national treasure with unique properties: soil conductivity, water content, metal content, and more that are hugely important in siting low-frequency positioning systems. Those long-gone engineers of the 1940s and ’50s knew this and chose accordingly.”
Before last month’s issue appeared but after it had gone to press, President Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for 2014. It contained several favorable New Year’s auguries for positioners, navigators, and timers.The act evinced an acute awareness of the vulnerability of space systems to disruption. The act is also a law governing the land. Through it Congress requires the administration to, among other things, explain biennially in its “Space Protection Strategy” report exactly how, in the event space systems are disrupted, DOD and the intelligence community “plan to provide necessary national security capabilities through alternative space, airborne, or ground systems.”
Since said administration acted early in its first term to decommission Loran-C, the congressional directive is pointed.
The next big thing coming up on the GNSS international horizon takes place in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, April 15–17: the European Navigation Conference, ENC-GNSS 2014. It includes a track session on “eLoran and other Low-Frequency Systems,” and I’ll be there with pencil sharpened.
Brad Parkinson will give the ENC keynote, and he is on record as one of an august group of Institute for Defense Analyses experts who unanimously recommended that the existing Loran-C be greatly updated and modernized to eLoran. We should hear more from him on this subject amid the wharves, waterways, and docks of Europe’s largest port (world’s third busiest).
There’s barely room left to report the successful tests of Enhanced Differential Loran (eDLoran) by Dutch specialists Reelektronika: absolute accuracy of 5 meters in the North Sea and in the Rotterdam Europort harbor area.
The departing Deputy Secretary of Transportation, John Porcari, wrote a letter in the closing days of 2013 opposing the U.S. Air Force’s announced plans to begin broadcasting Civil Navigation (CNAV) message-populated L2C and L5 signals as early as April 2014. Military personnel are incensed over what they see as Porcari’s impugning, when not ignoring, the Air Force 35-year track record of broadcasting the gold standard of global navigation satellite signals — something in which Transportation has zero experience.
Porcari alludes in his December 27 letter to “non-standard engineering tools” and “non-standard operations” that he believes would come into play for early CNAV broadcast. “These have the potential to inject human error, which may result in unacceptable GPS constellation operation.”
What Porcari means by “non-standard” he does not specify, although he confesses to unease as “the ability to monitor these signals, [without which] the system will not know if the L2C and LS signals are within specification. Given these risks, DOT is concerned that the CNAV messages could provide hazardously misleading information, impacting GPS safety-of-life, protection of property, and economic security applications.” The full text of the Porcari letter is available here.
In addition to questioning Air Force 2 SOPS ability to broadcast an accurate, compliant signal containing CNAV, the letter appears to ignore — or be ignorant of — the 17 official U.S. government/military monitoring sites for GPS distributed around the world, not to mention thousands of other monitoring sites run by government agencies such as the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and by many universities such as Stanford, Ohio State, Cal Tech, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and many other international institutions around the world. Many of these sites collaborate under the rubric of the International GNSS Service.
Finally, two private corporations monitor and correct all GPS signals both from space and on the ground: John Deere and Trimble Navigation. Both companies run commercial, automated GPS signal monitoring systems that that report any glitch, change, power fluctuation, or anomaly in the navigation message for all GPS signals with an average two-second notification time.
“This letter is so much BS,” fumed one source who wished to remain anonymous, “coming from an agency that is in arrears in its GPS payments to the tune of more than $70 million and has no clue how to represent the global GPS user. GPS is a ubiquitous system, not just a tool for the DOT and the Federal Aviation Administration. GPS needs to implement these signals for all users and as a modernization program that was promised to be in place years ago.”
It happens every year and it is an emotional rollercoaster. It generally starts a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving and continues until just after New Years – and it is simply heartbreaking. The letters and emails start arriving just like clockwork before the holidays and they all ask the same question – where can I buy the PHGPST or the Perfect Handheld GPS Transceiver?
As many of you know, who are faithful readers, I receive hundreds of letters and emails like this throughout the year from our warfighters and first responders, but the letters and emails over the holidays are special because they are from the wives, sisters, children, parents and grandparents of war fighters. They want nothing but the best for their loved ones. It breaks my heart to have to tell them that the PHGPST does not exist – yet.
Without a doubt, our warfighters and first responders, who put their lives on the line so that we may continue to live and thrive in a free world, where innovation and response to customer needs are hopefully met with success both emotional and fiscal, deserve nothing but the best, and that is the goal I continue to pursue on their behalf.
Dissatisfaction
Paraphrasing Walter Kaufman, “Otherworldliness or ‘belief that there is a better world’ is the child of disenchantment with this world.” To say our warfighters are disenchanted with the antiquated legacy MUE or military user equipment they are forced by policy to utilize today is an understatement. DoD’s antediluvian MUE is a joke compared to what is available in the commercial marketplace today. Studies indicate our warfighters are aware of this dichotomy and have shown their disdain in the last ten years by using commercial and civil PNT equipment in theater 40/1 over the government’s archaic MUE handheld devices. Studies further show that MUE is utilized by our warfighters only as a last resort and as a matter of necessity due to the outdated policies and technologies that continue to prevail. However, I am happy to say these anachronistic restrictions are reportedly rapidly coming to an end.
Consider that the USMC (US Marine Corps) decertified the PLGR in 2009 because “the PLGR or Precision GPS Lightweight Receiver is an obsolete GPS military receiver” [ed. PLGR was designed circa 1988] and almost all Services today use the DAGR or Defense Advanced GPS Receiver [ed. the DAGR was designed circa 2002]. The DAGR was a major capability improvement ten years ago but today is technologically obsolete and primarily used as an embedded solution only. As an embedded device the DAGR serves its purpose — providing an antiquated, unfriendly user interface to legacy government equipment. For example, rumor has it that one version of the Stryker, of which the Army has more than 4,200 in service, described as a technologically advanced combat fighting vehicle, uses nine, count them, nine individual DAGRs. Draw your own conclusions. I suspect this has more to do with the inadequacies of the DAGR vice the capabilities of the Stryker. The good news here is that my sources in the DoD tell me there will be no further DAGR purchases. Now if I were giving this as an oral presentation, I would pause here for thundering applause and a standing ovation. Can I have an Amen?
Several years ago, I penned the following: “MUE is necessary because it is the only platform that currently provides SAASM (selective availability anti-spoofing module) protection, along with a second military frequency giving the military user an advantage over his civilian counterpart.” Today none of that statement is true from a purely intrinsic or commercial point of view. There are much more capable receivers with all these capabilities and more, to include real-time centimeter-level accuracy, available on the commercial market today.
Marketplace Responds
This year the PNT (position, navigation and timing) marketplace has finally responded, and I am able to reply to warfighter family enquiries with more positive information. In just the last 18-24 months, the path to an actual PHGPST has been blazed by several major GPS manufacturers, and well-informed pundits say DOD policy changes may be in the wind as well.
The PHGPST
I had a three-hour lunch several weeks ago with the chief PNT engineer from one of the companies pursuing the PHGPST. It was enlightening to hear him wax eloquent concerning their new PNT device and the capabilities it will provide the warfighter, first responders and commercial/civil users as well. Indeed, there is a real possibility, if DoD policy changes lag technology (can you imagine that ever happening?) that civil/ commercial users may be the first recipients of this technological manna from the gods. But not to worry — if the actions of our warfighters during the last ten years of warfare are any indication, the warfighters and first responders will merely purchase what they need, from whatever sources are available, regardless of antiquated policy and doctrine. As one Marine lieutenant colonel warfighter commander so eloquently phrased it, “So please tell me where I can purchase the PHGPST…because when your life and those of your fellow Marines is on the line, who gives a damn about policy … give me the best solution possible … because the current #@*&% MUE is not even in the same ballpark as the best.”
Unfortunately, the chief engineer declined to allow me to use the name of his company, but they have promised me a pre-production unit to test and write about. As to time frame, he assures me there will still be plenty of snow banks and icy mud puddles in Colorado for my exhaustive real-world tests. Ever since that lunch I have been like a kid at Christmas… I just can’t wait for the test unit to arrive.
Trimble
However, while I am waiting with bated breath, another major PNT company/manufacturer pursuing the PHGPST has gone public with its intentions, and that is Trimble. I had the pleasure of visiting with Ann Ciganer and other Trimble executives in San Jose for a day recently, and then in early November attended Trimble Dimensions for the first time. I was simply amazed. Talk about feeling like a kid in a candy store – and that feeling had nothing to do with the venue – the Mirage in Las Vegas. Seriously, Jim Sheldon, general manager of Trimble’s Mobile Computing Solutions (MCS) Division and his team in Corvallis, Oregon, have outdone themselves. Their rugged line of PNT devices is simply jaw dropping in appearance and capability. I was privileged to sit in on some MCS planning meetings and I was blown away by what I heard — none of which I can relate here because of NDAs (non-disclosure agreements) and such — but suffice it to say that Trimble has been listening to its customers (what a concept) including warfighters/first responders, and it shows in the devices hitting the market now and in the next few months.
I was very impressed, and I guess it showed because one company PR/marketing pundit commented that I could probably write about nothing but Trimble rugged equipment for the next twelve months. Although he said it in jest, he was more correct than he knew. Indeed, another person in that group commented that I could write nothing but reviews for the next twelve months and become known as the Gunnery Sergeant Lee Emery military twin for GNSS. You may remember Emery hosted two History Channel programs: Mail Call, where he answered military questions, both modern and historic; and Lock N’ Load with R. Lee Ermey, which focused on the development of different types of military equipment, mostly weapons. I personally never missed an episode of either program and while I am flattered at the comparison, frankly I prefer the written word. But it does offer up the possibility of conducting even more PNT/GNNS equipment evaluations – the only issue being that it takes me about six weeks to properly evaluate a piece of PNT equipment, and it really helps if there is are lots of snow banks and deep icy puddles around. And remember, my rules of engagement are to never write a bad review, because why should you spend your time reading about something you can’t use, and, if at all possible, I won’t review equipment I have not personally used in the field under the most austere conditions available.
So in the next twelve months we will be looking hard at candidates vying for the title of the PHGPST, and I will do my best to keep you abreast of all the technological advancements and policy changes that make that possible. And maybe next year as the holidays approach, I will be able to respond with a plethora of choices for the PHGPST.
The European Space Agency has issued an intriguing Intended Invitation To Tender, “Weak GNSS Signal Navigation on the Moon.” The study will investigate use of weak-signal GPS/GNSS — and of course ESA is interested primarily in the use of Galileo — for real-time position, navigation and timing information to various future lunar assets such as automated landers, rovers, Earth-Moon transportation vehicle, in-situ navigation, and so on.
Does ESA have a lunar exploration agenda? This I did not know, but with only my own ignorance to thank, I quickly found out that ESA has had a lunar orbiter, SMART-1 (Small Missions for Advanced Research in Technology), since 2004, equipped with an Advanced Moon Imaging Experiment (AMIE) micro-camera and a mission, at least in part, to zero-in on suitable study sites for potential future lunar exploration missions.
Since the conclusion of that project, ESA now plans to land a spacecraft in 2018 near the Moon’s south pole, a region full of dangerous boulders and high ridges. The aim is to probe the moonscape and test new technology — and now we know this includes GNSS — to prepare for future human landings. “The region may be a prime location for future human explorers because it offers almost continuous sunlight for power and potential access to vital resources such as water-ice.”
“Although the visibility geometry is not always favorable,” the current ESA Invitation to Tender states, “it would result in 100-500m position accuracy as estimated in a NASA JPL/Ohio University paper. For lunar navigation applications, GPS/Galileo signals could be used if receivers complemented with advanced processing signal and filtering techniques, are capable of acquisition and tracking in the order of 15dBHz signal to noise ratios. Today latest developments show that these values are feasible. The PNT performance figures could also be improved with a GNSS-based system on a lunar relay satellite orbiting the moon as analyzed in [RD3]. The hardware required is equivalent to GPS space-based receivers and a high gain antenna.”
The invitation to tender, to the tune of 200,000–500,000 euros, closes on April 23.
GNSS use in space exploration, novel as it seems, has been outlined and partially explored in previously published articles in GPS World.
In September 2008, Jim Miller and A.J. Oria brought us all up to date on the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA’s) plans to use GPS in the great dark out-there.
“NASA has engaged with the Department of Defense (DoD) to define the performance parameters to support navigation services in a Space Service Volume (SSV) designated from 3,000 kilometers to GEO altitude to approximately 36,000 kilometers,” they wrote in “NASA’s Vision for Space.”
“This type of navigation requires specialized software to process the side-lobes of GPS signals coming over the earth’s limb, as well as the increased attenuation and tracking of a very few satellites at a time. Once tracking is initiated. however, one can begin to imagine a future where GPS-in-space may also include syncing GPS positioning and timing with spacecraft and beacons broadcasting other “GPS-like” signals near celestial bodies such as the moon and Mars.
“Transition from terrestrial-based radar tracking of space vehicles to space-based radiometric data from GPS is well underway at NASA. Simulations demonstrate GPS Navigator receiver applications could be performed almost to the moon. An ongoing effort is developing the TDRSS Augmentation Service for Satellites (TASS) to disseminate differential corrections from the Global Differential GPS (GDGPS) network to users in LEO. The Communication, Navigation, Networking, reConfigurable Testbed (CoNNeCT) on the ISS will use software-defined radios to process GPS/GNSS signals and waveforms.’
Also, in “GPS Goes Martian: Nav/Com for a Red Planet,” a 2004 article by Susan Skone, Kyle O’Keefe, and Gerard Lachapelle, the authors describe plans for a network of satellites to be placed in orbit around our eerie solar-system sibling for the purpose of GPS-like navigation.
Finally, way back in 2002, a group of authors proposed “Formation Flight in Space.” Russell Carpenter, Michael Moreau, Jonathan How, Lesse Leitner, Frank Bauer and David Folta described how distributed spacecraft systems are developing new GPS capabilities, on the drawing boards, at least.
“Scientists have just begun to understand the full potential of space vehicle formation flying. In the last few years, this technology has gone from a space oddity — and a high risk one at that — to a concept fully embraced by earth and space scientists around the world. Prior to the selection of the New Millennium Program Earth Orbiter-1 (EO-1) mission in 1996 (the first autonomous formation flying earth science mission), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) had only one or two formation flying concepts under consideration. Now 35 mission sets fill that list.”
If any young and adventurous engineers out there have been lamenting the dearth of new frontiers for them to explore GNSSively, cry no more.
The U.S. Departments of Defense and Transportation declared their strong opposition to the proposal of LightSquared Subsidiary LLC to operate a nationwide broadband service within the spectrum immediately adjacent to GPS signals, in a letter sent on June 14 to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA). The agencies acted on behalf of the on behalf of the National Executive Committee for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing, which they are responsible for co-chairing.
The Departments asked the NTIA administrator to advise the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to continue to withhold authorization for LightSquared to commence commercial service per its proposed deployment of a terrestrial service within the 1525-1559 MHz bands. LightSquared’s proposal is to deploy a network of 40,000 base stations along with some satellite coverage over 139 major markets in the United States.
According to their official statement, “The Departments continue to support the National Broadband Plan, but cannot do so at the expense of a global, ubiquitous utility such as the Global Positioning System. The Departments encourage further assessment of any alternative spectrum and/or signal configuration plans.”
The DoD/DoT letter was sent just prior to the original deadline for the final report of the Technical Working Group commissioned by the FCC to research and recommend on this matter. Certainly, the respective signers were cognizant of the contents of that report, at least on the test results regarding interference with GPS. As it turned out, on June 15 LightSquared asked for more time, and was granted a two-week extension. The final report was filed with the FCC on June 30.
The Departments’ position followed an interagency review of the findings of the National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing Systems Engineering Forum (NPEF), tasked to assess the GPS impacts of LightSquared’s deployment plan as originally filed. The NPEF determined that, if permitted to operate as originally planned, LightSquared’s signals would significantly interfere with GPS users and, as a result, impact national security, economic security, and public safety nationwide. The NPEF report served as working material for the TWG report.
The NTIA Administrator forwarded the letter and report to the FCC Chairman on July 6. These materials can be found at www.PNT.gov.
