GPS plays such an important role inour lives these days, it is almost inconceivable that it should stop working or get blocked by some evil goer. But it can and does happen with local disruptions happening more that we might like. The chance that GPS might be disabled somehow during a major conflict led the U.S. Naval Academy to start teach celestrial navigation after abandoning the ancient skill a decade ago. For offshore sailors, losing GPS can be a serious head ache as it is for captains of any ships at seas. Captain Richard Madden explores what’s going on with GPS and how it might fail in an article in the journal Maritime Executive.
“The U.S. Maritime Administration issued U.S. Maritime Alert 2018-004 A “Possible GPS Interference – Eastern Mediterranean Sea” on March 23 in in response to reports of GPS disruptions and interference from multiple vessels and aircraft between Cyprus and Port Said, Egypt. These reports come on the heels of multiple warnings by the same agency in 2017 of GPS disruptions in the Black Sea, primarily off the coast of Novorossiysk, Russia. These same warnings reaffirmed that GPS disruptions are a global concern and provided guidance for reporting to the U.S. Coast Guard.” Read more.
