GPS Interference at Dallas

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Palmpilot

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https://arstechnica.com/information...s-gps-outage-that-rerouted-texas-air-traffic/

Excerpt:

The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating the cause of mysterious GPS interference that, over the past few days, has closed one runway at the Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport and prompted some aircraft in the region to be rerouted to areas where signals were working properly.

The interference first came to light on Monday afternoon when the FAA issued an advisory over ATIS (Automatic Terminal Information Service). It warned flight personnel and air traffic controllers of GPS interference over a 40-mile swath of airspace near the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. The advisory read in part: “ATTN ALL AIRCRAFT. GPS REPORTED UNRELIABLE WITHIN 40 NM OF DFW.”​
 
I'm surprised they don't have GPS towers / boosters around key airport to provide a backup signal.
 
edessa said:
This reminded me of the 2013 GPS issue at Newark. A truck driver had a GPS jammer and cause some issues at the airport. Article here. Wonder if its something similar in Texas.
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I remember that one too.

This was a really big outage, though, that appears to have the authorities either stumped or not talking.

Link to animation: https://twitter.com/lemonodor/status/1582202955272359936

gpsjam-01.jpg
 
WDD said:
I'm surprised they don't have GPS towers / boosters around key airport to provide a backup signal.
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How would that work? Typical light aircraft GPS antennae are pointed at the sky and away from the ground.
 
asicer said:
How would that work? Typical light aircraft GPS antennae are pointed at the sky and away from the ground.
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It isn't even that. You can't just "boost" a GPS signal from the ground. You can supplement it with WAAS to resolve errors, but whatever is happening near DFW is beyond the capacity of WAAS to correct.
 
There was a law enforcement conference in Dallas last Friday through Tuesday... I wonder if a GPS jamming vendor was demoing a product?
 
Zeldman said:
I used to use a ground based system that worked well. Had 3 letters....also used it to listen to music late at night...also could be used for a cheap strike finder.
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"Now a dying technology, ADF-based navigation was once the foundation of the airspace system. VORs eventually replaced it and, more recently, it has been made nearly obsolete by GPS satellite navigation."

Oopsie daisy.
 
Jeff Oslick said:
It isn't even that. You can't just "boost" a GPS signal from the ground. You can supplement it with WAAS to resolve errors, but whatever is happening near DFW is beyond the capacity of WAAS to correct.
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The last leg of the WAAS correction is from satellite to aircraft so I suppose it's not too surprising that WAAS can't compensate for the jamming.

Edit: Did you mean LAAS?
verifying-gbas-signals-reliability_ac_3607-2026-92_02_w640_hX.jpg

laas4_0.jpg
 
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edessa said:
Basically saying s**t happens, deal with it.
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Just like when GPS jamming is being practiced in the White Sands Restricted areas. Only thing to do is just wait it out and go back to ''old time'' navigation. But I did learn to defeat the jamming. I just get below the ridge of mountains between me and the restricted areas and the GPS works again.
 
If I don't know where I is I surely don't know where I isn't, but I might once know where I was.......... Maybe
 
I've seen some quirky GPS data on some mapping data flown in that same region recently, but it wasn't completely a loss. I'm talking a slightly anomaly while doing IMU-aided differential GPS processing with accuracies down to a few cm. Nothing so bad as to affect aircraft navigation.
 
FPK1 said:
There was a law enforcement conference in Dallas last Friday through Tuesday... I wonder if a GPS jamming vendor was demoing a product?
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I'm not sure what law enforcement agency would have a need, much less the authority, to jam GPS.
 
Zeldman said:
Just like when GPS jamming is being practiced in the White Sands Restricted areas. Only thing to do is just wait it out and go back to ''old time'' navigation. But I did learn to defeat the jamming. I just get below the ridge of mountains between me and the restricted areas and the GPS works again.
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In 2007 I started flying an airplane with GPS, Loran, and DME/DME. For several years we flew between Dallas and Phoenix a few times a month. Several times around White Sands we would lose GPS but it did not bother us. I remember one day several planes said they lost GPS and were asking center for vectors. Center finally asked us if we needed vectors. My reply was, "No we have Loran". After they shut down Loran, it still did not bother us with DME/DME.
 
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