GPS jamming

[streaky]

For those using their SatNavs off Kirkwall in mid-July.

Ministry of Defence said:

The UK Ministry of Defence has informed Ofcom of the following GPS jamming exercise:

Dates: Jamming will be conducted on a maximum of 3 week-days in the period 10-21 July 2011. Times: 0900 -1730 BST.

Location: Jamming aircraft will orbit at 10,000ft above mean sea-level (AMSL) along a 50nm flightpath on a heading of 270°T from Kirkwall, starting 10nm to the west of Kirkwall and ending 60nm to the west of Kirkwall

Possible areas affected: The GPS jamming is likely to affect civilian Standard Positioning Service (SPS) receivers over a large area. A minimum jammer to signal vulnerability of 30dB has been assumed for a civilian receiver. Signal theory suggests that a SPS civilian receiver should have approximately 32dB of jamming resistance.

Safety of Life Operations: Safety of life operations will take precedence over exercise activities at all times. To this end, the AWC is open to further discussion with any official recipient on the potential implications of this jamming exercise.

Contact point: During the exercise, any official recipient (or their delegated representative) and any member of the Emergency Services may terminate the jamming for safety reasons by calling the contact numbers below:

(1) Primary: Duty Controller Flying (TLT), RAF Kinloss - Tel: [phone].
(2) Backup: Duty Controller Flying (TLT), RAF Lossiemouth - Tel: [phone].
(3) Tertiary: Duty Air Surveillance Officer, National Air and Space Operations Centre Tel: [phone].

Note: Safety of life operations will take precedence over exercise activities at all times.

-*-*-*-

We have speculated on this before, in relation to proposals for the external control or monitoring of vehicle speed.

UK Royal Academy of Engineering report on GPS jamming said:

We regularly detect instances of GPS jammers in use as we monitor radio activity around the UK. The plot from one of our detectors shows one which we saw in use on the A4 near Kew Bridge.

http://talksatellite.com/EMEA-A1474.htm

Streaky

PS - faulty link construction (cut-n-pasted) corrected - S

Edited by streaky on Wednesday 23 March 09:46

[jshell]

UK Royal Academy of Engineering report on GPS jamming said:

We regularly detect instances of GPS jammers in use as we monitor radio activity around the UK. The plot from one of our detectors shows one which we saw in use on the A4 near Kew Bridge.

http://talksatellite.com/EMEA-A1474.htm

Link wasn't working. Is now...

[Scraggles]

jammers seem pretty good way to stop the muppets who constantly talk very loudly into their phone on the train and great against those company cars tracking where they are

[davepoth]

It doesn't need to be anything as complicated as a jammer - a bit of tinfoil over the aerial is usually enough to stop the signal getting to the satnav.

[spikeyhead]

I read nm in the OP as nanometres instead of nautical miles.

Took me a while to realise what they meant.

[FunkyNige]

Scraggles said:

jammers seem pretty good way to stop the muppets who constantly talk very loudly into their phone on the train and great against those company cars tracking where they are

There was an article in New Scientist a few weeks ago about GPS jamming - it mentioned there was an issue with air traffic control system going haywire once or twice a day that the authorities eventually tracked down to a passing truck with a GPS jammer!

edit - link
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20202-gps-ch...

Edited by FunkyNige on Wednesday 23 March 19:59

[streaky]

davepoth said:

It doesn't need to be anything as complicated as a jammer - a bit of tinfoil over the aerial is usually enough to stop the signal getting to the satnav.

That would take some precision bombing and reshaping of the chaff into little cones.

Streaky