RussR
En-Route
To be fair, the equipment shack in that picture almost certainly contains more than just that for the DME.I think it includes the red/white enclosure.
To be fair, the equipment shack in that picture almost certainly contains more than just that for the DME.I think it includes the red/white enclosure.
While there are 592 radio stations in Florida, most of them are FM which legacy ADF cannot use. According to Radio-Locator.com Florida has 209 AM stations, more than enough to dial up a station within 40 miles of your location in a pinch. I live in Virginia which has 131, and the GPS interruption occurred in Ohio which has 111. I'd say my flight that day had the potential to use maybe 10 or more different AM stations along my route, including one less than 8 miles from my home airport. That's more than the VORs that were available, including Cassonova which was out of service at the time.Yeah! That was MY post! But you might agree that with 592 AM radio stations in Florida it would be nice to have a simple device that keeps a running estimate of your position by utilizing them as a backup to GPS. https://radiostation.info/am/florida/
Seems like they could just "turn it back on"Bring back LORAN, lol.
that was regarding LORAN....Seems like they could just "turn it back on"
Probably not though......
Those coordinates seem preposterously precise. 0.00000000000001 degrees is a resolution of 0.00000004 inches, or approximately 1 nanometer. Or about 1/3 the width of a DNA molecule. If I did my math right.(34.06259460717931, -77.91309685852718).
Bring back LORAN, lol.
I’ll offer a one word solution: Omega.
I used it while in the Navy. But it has its quirks, too.
-Skip
straight from a click on google mapsThose coordinates seem preposterously precise. 0.00000000000001 degrees is a resolution of 0.00000004 inches, or approximately 1 nanometer. Or about 1/3 the width of a DNA molecule. If I did my math right.
Oh, I believe you, I just see any reason for any navigation software to provide coordinates at the molecular level!straight from a click on google maps
yeah, I think 7 digits gives you to less than an inch and 6 to less than a foot.Oh, I believe you, I just see any reason for any navigation software to provide coordinates at the molecular level!
Good Question. Actually, both questions. The first being, @Lon Stratton's: why don't we just turn it back on? Almost all of the equipment has been disposed of and the towers torn down as indicated in Brad's post. This was done under the Obama administration (not making a judgement on his time as President, just giving context as to the timeline) and we had been moving toward disestablishing LORAN for several years up to that point. The decision was made during his tenure to finally flip the switch. At that time, there were a couple sites in very remote locations (Alaska, for example) that remained operational for a while. To my knowledge those have been disestablished as well. So no, we can't just turn them back on unfortunately. As for the question about the land, the answer varies widely. In some places, land was given back to local land management whether that be federal, local, tribal, state, whatever. In a few others, the federal government found other uses for the land. More often than not, it was repurposed for conservation of some sort. If I remember correctly, the LORAN site on the northern tip of Galveston Island, for example is a bird sanctuary today.that was regarding LORAN....
Just a few weeks ago I was back home in NC visiting family and took a scenic drive past the old Loran station near Carolina Beach (34.06259460717931, -77.91309685852718). I noticed the old Loran towers have been torn down and I was wondering what the Coast Guard is doing with that land these days....
With an integrated system, it could find initial position from a connection to your GPS. Like some ELTs do.Operationally, when you turned on the radio power, and the display came up, input the airport you are on, and it has a fix for a stating point. As you fly, the fix should remain very good. With a database of airports, it would also be capable oe 'direct to' guidance to any airport, or search and display 'Nearest airport'. My old database RNAV LORAN, had this capability, but it is now in the College Park Aviation Museum,
The Poles were recognized for their flying ability during the Battle of Britain, so…But loran had distance limitations, whereas the vlf/omega was good world wide. Not sure about the poles.
.....a special onboard camera to match what is under the plane.
For the same reason Garmin, Avidyne, and others are able to sell products. Convenience.Why not just use my eyes and fly by pilotage?
It's going to work really well in those scenarios where GPS is needed the most - IFR in IMC.special onboard camera to match what is under the plane.
WSJ has an article on gps spoofing linked on drudge today. Not sure if anything is new, just more general alarm and happening more here than before
See Salty's post about losing gps on top of a layer.Why not just use my eyes and fly by pilotage?
Given that the standard service volume of an NDB was only 25 miles IIRC, you're gonna need a lot of 'em. There are better options.The GPS network is a remarkable system allowing navigation flexibility and ease of use, but it is only as good as the signals available. My recent flight proved to me it's vulnerability to be interrupted. My situation occurred mid flight so it was easy for me to maintain my flight but what if it had happened during IMC conditions or during an IFR approach?
I have been doing some research into this and I think the FAA needs to rethink this policy and add back some ground based radio navigation systems especially NDBs. Why NDBs? NDBs are the least expensive ground based navigation system available. They are easy to maintain as they require minimal maintenance. In the cockpit they are less precise and harder to use than VORs but they have the advantage of using not only dedicated NDBs but also AM radio station signals that require zero maintenance costs incurred by the FAA.
In short I think the FAA should reevaluate their position on NDBs and reinstate many of them for use as navigation aids as a backup to GPS. I realize I am likely in the minority in this line of thinking, but I am intending to reinstall an ADF in my airplane for this reason.
I am interested on your thoughts on this subject. What do you think?
Well... There was talk briefly of the new eLORAN system being the ground-based backup. It requires far fewer stations than either VOR or NDB.Bring back LORAN, lol.
That works for a lot of types of transmitters. A single VORTAC can be used to get a position, but you'll need more than that for non-directional signals. It can be done though.Interesting topic
1) Like stated above, why not have a device that can pick up multiple frequencies and triangulate your position? Make the FAA talk to the FCC, find out where ground based towers are and what frequencies, keep the map updated, and let your nav computer figure it out.
Ummm... That's just using GPS.3) Even at 10,000 feet my adult kids track me when I fly up to see them. On "Find my I Phone". Actually easier to use than flight tracking software. So let's incorporate that tech.
High altitude VORs have the same service volumes at lower altitudes that the low-altitude VORs do, so they're effectively exactly the same to those of us down in the normally aspirated piston altitudes.Yes, but I believe they're focusing on decommissioning the low altitude VORs and that the MON will be primarily high altitude stations. Since piston GA flies at lower altitudes, I think the impact on little gasoline burners will be more significant than the overall hit.
Boating years ago I had a handheld am radio direction finder that you waved around until you received a station with known heading to plot. Had a compass built in and earplug speaker. Cheap backupNot too long ago I flew through an area where GPS coverage was interrupted or possibly jammed for about ½ hour. I continued navigating by dead reckoning and dialed up the nearest VOR to use as a reference. Fortunately there was an active VOR along my route, but VORs are being decommissioned every day and the number remaining is dwindling fast along with their NDB counterparts.
The GPS network is a remarkable system allowing navigation flexibility and ease of use, but it is only as good as the signals available. My recent flight proved to me it's vulnerability to be interrupted. My situation occurred mid flight so it was easy for me to maintain my flight but what if it had happened during IMC conditions or during an IFR approach?
I have been doing some research into this and I think the FAA needs to rethink this policy and add back some ground based radio navigation systems especially NDBs. Why NDBs? NDBs are the least expensive ground based navigation system available. They are easy to maintain as they require minimal maintenance. In the cockpit they are less precise and harder to use than VORs but they have the advantage of using not only dedicated NDBs but also AM radio station signals that require zero maintenance costs incurred by the FAA.
In short I think the FAA should reevaluate their position on NDBs and reinstate many of them for use as navigation aids as a backup to GPS. I realize I am likely in the minority in this line of thinking, but I am intending to reinstall an ADF in my airplane for this reason.
I am interested on your thoughts on this subject. What do you think?
See Salty's post about losing gps on top of a layer.
Your eyes can see in infrared?
Some do. And used ones are VERY cheapI wish planes still had ADF.
Not without it's issues, but I flew a lot of miles, AM radio station to AM radio station, back in the day.
I've got my KR 87, and the Argus 7000-CE eRMI-"Moving Map" display it was hooked to, sitting in a box in my basement...Some do. And used ones are VERY cheap
Interesting topic...
3) Even at 10,000 feet my adult kids track me when I fly up to see them. On "Find my I Phone". Actually easier to use than flight tracking software. So let's incorporate that tech.
Ah. I had thought it was cell tower generated. I was way off track on that. (Pun intended )It's "poor man's" ADS-B. The iPhone is sending GPS coordinates when pinged. GPS goes down so will "find my iPhone" unless it's in the same proximity of bluetooth range.
It's "poor man's" ADS-B. The iPhone is sending GPS coordinates when pinged. GPS goes down so will "find my iPhone" unless it's in the same proximity of bluetooth range.
Ah. I had thought it was cell tower generated. I was way off track on that. (Pun intended )
To conserve battery life, phones don't leave their GPS powered on all the time. When Location Services requires an accurate position, they first query the nearest tower to get the time and approximate position (really, the position of the tower) and that is how it knows which GPS satellites should be "visible" in the sky so it can specifically tune those and get a position as quickly as possible.Ah. I had thought it was cell tower generated. I was way off track on that. (Pun intended )
To conserve battery life, phones don't leave their GPS powered on all the time. When Location Services requires an accurate position, they first query the nearest tower to get the time and approximate position (really, the position of the tower) and that is how it knows which GPS satellites should be "visible" in the sky so it can specifically tune those and get a position as quickly as possible.
It's not that high of a number - low 100s range IIRC. There used to be a note in the A/FD remarks for ORD that aircraft on the ground should turn off their DME so as to avoid flooding their DME frequencies.I forget what it is, but there’s an upper limit to the number of users on a traditional DME. You run out of transponder airtime. It’s a high number but it’s there.
An interesting idea.One could likely implement a fairly good location system as long as the database of cell site locations was truly provided (public records have some purposeful errors in them for security reasons, don’t trust the FCC data either — they know), from the carriers — and a receiver could throw away any clearly oddball sites — since there’s no guarantee a site is truly operational/not whacked out.