The following was delivered as an invited presentation at the Civil GPS Service Interface Committee plenary session, held September 20 in Portland, Oregon. Hi, my name is Alan, and I’m an accuracy addict. I got my first taste of accuracy back in 2000 when I started at GPS World, and discovered th...
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As this issue goes to press in late August, the first Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) space vehicle, nicknamed Michibiki, holds steady for a September 11 launch. QZSS will use multiple satellites in inclined orbits, placed so that one satellite always appears ...
Read More →Michibiki has more Twitter followers than you and me put together. All of you, and all of me with my 17 followers. Michibiki hit 16,284 when I signed on just now, and she (he?) has not yet even emerged upon the global stage. Perhaps by the time you read this, if the September 11 launch date holds tr...
Read More →We now definitively declare “curtain up!” on the second act of the human and technological drama, Interoperable Global Navigation Satellite Systems, by many authors, directors, and actors, upon the global stage. It happened on August 2 with removal of the message 0 (“Do Not Use in aviation”)...
Read More →September 1992. One of the first industrial uses of GPS came in survey and seismic exploration for offshore oil, as evidenced by the cover story of this magazine’s September 1992 issue. A salient passage from that 18-year-old “Quality Control For Differential GPS in Offshore Oil and Gas Explorat...
Read More →At press time, GPS spacecraft IIF-1 was set to be launched May 27 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. This first of a new generation of satellites will travel quickly — instead of taking several days to reach its orbital slot, the new satellite should make the journey in thre...
Read More →“This is an event where one gets one’s goals for the next year.” Paul Verhoef, program director for satellite navigation programs of the European Commission, may have exaggerated for effect, and for the benefit of his audience and hosts at the Munich Satellite Navigation Summit in March. But n...
Read More →With final satellite construction bids pending as this magazine goes to press, the Galileo program clarified a recent round of launch postponements and announced that the European Union (EU) will rescind its requirement for a special license to manufacture and sell Galileo receivers. “We have an a...
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