The Coast Guard-operated Long Range Navigation system (Loran) managed to survive the Obama administration's cancellation attempts until at least January thanks to language in the final version of the Homeland Security Department Appropriations bill, which awaits the president's signature.
The conference report on the bill, which the House and Senate approved on Oct. 20, provides $12 million to operate the Coast Guard's 24 Loran stations through Jan. 10, 2010.
The report said operations shall continue beyond that date unless Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen certifies that the termination of the Loran signal will not adversely impact the safety of maritime navigation and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano certifies Loran is not needed as a backup to GPS.
This, in my view, does not offer much hope for continued operation of Loran, and its enhanced version, eLoran, which provide a terrestrial jam and missile proof backup to GPS satellites.
eLoran provides position accuracy to between 8 feet and 65 feet, with availability measured at 99.9 percent and integrity at 99.99 percent, according to the International Loran Association. GPS offers position accuracy between 8 feet and 25 feet for civilian users, but its high-frequency, low-power signal can be jammed more easily than the low-frequency, high-power eLoran signals.
So why has the Obama administration decided to balance a $3.5 trillion federal budget by killing eLoran, which offers a GPS backup for just $40 million to $50 million a year?
Simple. The Coast Guard hates Loran, because it requires a lot of bodies to operate and maintain stations quite far from the sea, in places like Boise City, Okla., and Las Cruces, N.M.
Oh well, when GPS gets knocked out, there will be a lot of money to be made teaching folks how to use maps and compasses.
COMMENTS
This bill is the farthest thing from communism. It is a compromise but not communism. Gosh, it isn’t even socialism. The bill keeps the private health insurance industry in place, forces it to be more efficient and expands its market by 30 million people. We are free to make our own choices and it is completely ridiculous to say that our government runs “everything in our lives”.
Jana Pharo 10/23/10 07:42 am ET
Guys, you know the President needs to find ways to take money from the defense sector so he can give it to welfare people and programs that foster illegal immagration, it's just another step in his redistribution of wealth at the expense of national defense. Besides, it was easy low hanging fruit because the Coast Guard was tired of maintaining the system regardless of its usefulness to our defense.
DefenderOfTheFreeWorld 10/27/09 03:11 pm ET
Loran can also provide timing and navigation service in places that GPS can't, such as in dense foliage, in canyons (urban and natural), indoors and even a few feet under water, making it a natural complement to GPS even when it *is* working.
Hugh Shane 10/26/09 03:55 pm ET
Perhpas we have put way too many of our eggs in the GPS basket. With my very rudimentary understanding of orbital mechanics it appears that the GPS satellite constellation may be very vulnerable to destruction.
Is it possible that any nation with orbital capability and a launch site at 55 degrees latitude or less can a use direct assent orbital attack methodologies to initiate coplanar attack?
Is it possible that any nation capable of launching to a highly elliptical orbit on the equatorial plane could use very few launches to contaminate the entire plane between the apogee and perigee of the attack orbit; an orbital plane that every satellite crosses twice each orbital period?
Once the initial attacks occur would it even be possible to replace the assets due to the resulting debris fields?
GPS is a great system in a peaceful world; but I am confident that any conflict involving a nation capable of launching to 25000 KM can and probably will result in the system being brought down; degrading many of our tactical force multipliers as well as the massive systems used in the commercial sector.
eLoran is cheap, resilient, and much more easily defended when compared to space based systems.
Don’t just keep it --- improve upon it and encourage its use.
Mark 10/23/09 11:05 am ET
If the only objection to continued operation of LORAN is that it requires bodies at remote locations, the first question is WHY? Aren't we sophisticated enough to be able to manage the network remotely? Well, yes, I guess so. Then what? Don't want to spend the money? That's shortsighted, but assuming that we can't convince folks that that's shortsighted, could it be privatized? Why not offer it to Verizon, ATT, etc., as a Stratum 1 timing source for their networks?
Why are we collectively so ever-loving STUPID????????
arclight 10/23/09 07:59 am ET