FieldLogix Blog

GPS system signals are everywhere and the technology is used for literally thousands of applications, not just navigating drivers on the road. GPS technology is used to land airplanes, control financial services such as ATMs and stock trading, navigate ships and cargo, synchronize data on wireless networks, manage loads on power grids, etc.

Jamming the GPS system can wreak havoc on society in literally thousands of ways. Ways many people are not even aware of.

According to an article recently printed in the New Scientist, a British magazine, a global positioning system outage happened because the Navy accidentally jammed GPS signals in downtown San Diego in 2007.

New Scientist magazine wrote in its March 2011 edition: “It was just after midday in San Diego, California, when the disruption started. In the tower at the airport, air-traffic controllers peered at their monitors only to find that their system for tracking incoming planes was malfunctioning. At the Naval Medical Center, emergency pagers used for summoning doctors stopped working. Chaos threatened in the busy harbour, too, after the traffic-management system used for guiding boats failed. On the streets, people reaching for their cellphones found they had no signal and bank customers trying to withdraw cash from local ATMs were refused.”

The problem with the article in New Scientist is that most of what it reported wasn’t true. Although the Navy did admit to accidentally jamming GPS signals in San Diego in 2007, the outcome wasn’t anywhere nearly as catastrophic as the magazine made it out to be.

Even though gas prices have been coming down over the past few weeks, gas prices are still very high when compared to the the past few years. In many states, gas prices are still averaging over $4 per gallon. According to a recent article from Popular Mechanics, there are several things drivers can do to save money on fuel. Here are some driving tips from the Yahoo Autos article combined with a few tips from FieldLogix.

Driving Tip No. 1: Invest in a More Fuel Efficient Vehicle

Next time you go shopping for a new (or used) car, consider fuel economy when making your purchase decision. One great car for fuel efficiency is the Ford (NYSE:F)Focus SFE. It gets 28 mpg in the city and a whopping 40 mpg on the highway. With its sculpted flanks and radical windshield slope, the Focus looks like a 21st-century small car. The SFE model is tricked out for fuel economy. The 2.0-liter engine features direct fuel injection—good for a 10 percent efficiency gain, Ford says—and is coupled to an automated twin-clutch six-speed gearbox that drives low-rolling-resistance tires. Ford also includes stuff like Sync, LED interior lighting, Millennium Falcon instrumentation and with a $20,780 as-tested price, the Focus becomes impossible to ignore.

Driving Tip No. 2: Coast to a Stop

We all know brakes are necessary, but they’re incredibly wasteful. Accelerating until the last moment then braking hard to stop is less efficient than slowly coasting to a red light. Whenever possible, anticipate that a light will turn red and ease off the gas. Generally, the less you have to brake, the better your fuel economy.

A new set of government tests showed that LightSquared’s proposed mobile broadband network disrupted the signal strength to all GPS devices in the test area. The National Space-Based PNT Advisory Board reported yesterday that a series of 32 tests showed significant interference on GPS system receivers used by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), John Deer, U.S. Coast Guard, NASA and Garmin (GRMN).

Last week, construction giant Deere & Co. reported that during recent testing in New Mexico, LightSquared’s network hobbled it’s GPS systems more than 20 miles away. Local law enforcement also reported police cars and ambulances lost GPS signals. A separate Federal Aviation Administration-commissioned study found that “GPS operations below 2000 feet (elevation) would be unavailable over a large radius of metro (areas)” for aircraft.

While all global-positioning system (GPS) devices tested were affected, the severity of the loss of service varied, said Deane Bunce, co-chair of the National PNT Engineering Forum, a federal advisory group of engineers that oversaw the government tests, according to the Wall St. Journal. Mr. Bunce said some GPS devices lost signal strength while others were knocked out completely. For example, the government tests found that General Motors’ (GM) OnStar system saw a “significant degradation of service” on most receivers tested.

This week American researchers at Ohio State University revealed they have a new tool for detecting illegal nuclear explosions: the Earth’s global positioning system (GPS). The discovery was announced this week at a Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) meeting.

Researchers have discovered that nuclear tests leave a mark on the part of the upper atmosphere known as the ionosphere. After a nuclear explosion, there is a change in ionospheric electron density, as a bubble of disturbed particles spread out from the test site and across the planet. As the GPS signal passes through the edge of the bubble, the change in electron density disturbs the signal in a noticeable way.

Even though the GPS system was designed for location purposes, the technology has always been especially sensitive to atmospheric disturbances, said Dorota Grejner-Brzezinska, a professor of geodetic science at Ohio State University. The GPS system can help confirm that a nuclear test has taken place – especially when the test was underground, so that its effect in the air is very subtle, and otherwise nearly impossible to detect.