European agency warns of GNSS outages near ukraine

GNSS jamming and possible spoofing has intensified in areas surrounding Ukraine, according to the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA).

The agency issued a bulletin on March 17 warning of a GNSS outage leading to navigation and surveillance degradation. According to the bulletin, which was directed at national aviation authorities and airlines, reports analyzed by EASA indicate that, since Feb. 24, GNSS spoofing and jamming has intensified in four key geographical areas:

• the Kaliningrad region, surrounding Baltic Sea and neighboring states
• Eastern Finland
• the Black Sea
• the Eastern Mediterranean area near Cyprus, Turkey, Lebanon, Syria and Israel, as well as Northern Iraq.

“The effects of GNSS jamming and/ or possible spoofing were observed by aircraft in various phases of their flights,” the bulletin stated, “in certain cases leading to rerouting or even to change the destination due to the inability to perform a safe landing procedure.”

Potential issues include:

•  loss of ability to use GNSS for waypoint navigation
• loss of area navigation (RNAV) approach capability
• triggering of terrain warnings
• inconsistent aircraft position on the navigation display
• loss of ADS-B, wind shear, terrain and surface functionalities
• failure or degradation of ATM/ANS/ CNS and aircraft systems that use GNSS as a time reference
• airspace infringements and/or route deviations due to GNSS degradation.