The Department of Defense, Google and some other companies are working on a ground-based radionavigation system to supplement GPS. They're acting as if this is some Great New Invention and they are calling it "Locata".
I guess they've forgotten all about LORAN-C, which the frelling Coast Guard killed off three years ago. So these new guys come along with what is essentially LORAN-D and buckets of cash get shoveled their way in order to develop the very thing that once existed.
The bind moggles. Maybe if I conjure up a new national security requirement for dial telephones, the denizens of Fort Fumble will pay me a few billion dollars to develop such things.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
Comrade, you have it wrong. First telegraph, THEN after failure to meet expectations, you propose dial up.
Imagine what DoT can do when they realize ADS-B isn't the be all of air route surveillance and decides to invent RaDaT (Radio Detection and Tracking) to complement the new ground based Nav system they'll have to invent. I propose calling the facilities VORs—Very Obscenely Redundant (since they haven't quite killed off the existing airway network, yet.
LRod
ZJX, ORD, ZAU retired.
Any idea what LORAN costs to provide? I don't know either because nobody makes the transmitters anymore. Do you want to pay to replace the several 300' towers at each site that are now so corroded that they are safety hazards? Where is the user equipment? Do you have any in your airplane?
So? How will that compare to creating an entirely new system of radio nav from scratch?
I'm vaguely surprised they didn't try to resurrect OMEGA. That system came a lot closer to being genuinely global. It wasn't very practical on any platform with limited antenna exposure time, but was nevertheless installed in submarines--largely (I suspect) because its design involved some principles that pushed the math-geek buttons on most junior officers and a good percentage of the enlisted guys (at least in Nav/Ops).
Post a Comment