Galileo Snags

[Zeffy]

Minor delay (http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0d4cb3d0-d254-11db-a7c0-000b5df10621.html) or significant problems?

[green granite]

Sounds like the normal bickering that goes on in any EU funded project to me, each state wanting more of the work and therefore money/prestige than it already has. :ugh:

[brakedwell]

If it screws up Nu Labor's road pricing scam this is great news! :)

[Feather #3]

And no, no current GPS equipment will work, or be able to be modified to work, with Galileo!

You have simply got to be joking!!?? :rolleyes:

With all the GPS equipment available in the world right now, the Europeans have gone and re-invented Decca?? :ugh:

Is there no stopping the stupidity? :*

Tell me this isn't true.

G'day ;)

[brakedwell]

I hear they are having another look at Consol and Gee if Decca proves unreliable. :sad: :sad: :sad:

[A2QFI]

I understand that the first satellite is not due to be launched until 2010, at the earliest, and presumably there will need to be up to 24, or however many the US GPS has? Road charging in UK and based on Galileo is a VERY long way away!

[NavMonkey]

I understand that the first satellite is not due to be launched until 2010, at the earliest
Actually, it's already on orbit (http://www.giove.esa.int/page_index.php?menu=102&page_id=35) and has been for a while. Manufacturered by SSTL in sunny Guildford .

[seacue]

Wasn't the presently-orbiting satellite put up as a stop-gap to hold the frequency allocation? There was a "use or lose" deadline coming up and something had to be launched. It is definitely not part of the eventual Galileo constellation.

[NavMonkey]

It and its two GIOVE colleagues (B and A2) are (to be) on orbit for a number of reasons including securing the frequencies and supporting the Galileo IOV validation activities. They are as much a part of 'Galileo' as the Block I satellites were a part of GPS, but will most likely not form a part of the operational constellation if current political/industrial wranglings continue as they don't have a long enough design life... :ugh:

[Phantomski]

Rainboe,

as you probably know, current GNSS (be it NAVSTAR or GLONASS) are not primary aeronautical navigation systems, as the simply cannot be because they don't meet ICAO requirements. The main reasons are quite simple -
1.) No failure warning (receiver has no idea about SVs degradation of any transmitted data)
2.) Not enough precision (specifically in vertical axis - altitude)
3.) No guarantee of derived position
As you can probably imagine, this is a no-go for aviation. That's why there are no GPS let downs authorised (well, not without other systems like baro altimeter or with quite a high minima) and why FMC automatically disregards GNSS position information in favor of IRS + ground external systems.

Even though it can be greatly enhanced using differential methods (mainly ground based LAAS), there will still be the primary problem - no guarantee. This is very serious issue.

NAVSTAR and GLONASS were not even originally meant for civil use and are not run and maintained by civil organizations. I'm not talking about intentional degradation rumors, which were neven proven true (I was actually doing GPS field survey during Iraq war in Gulf area without any problems, so I probably know what I am talking about) or the fear of shutdown of service. I am talking about legal obligations, reliability, guaranteed parameters and service availability. In other words...about safety.

Galileo was build from ground up to meet ICAO requirements a provide required level of monitoring and backup. It's designed to overcome the above mentioned problems. It has the potential (with LAAS) to provide CAT III capability. The extras added which you were talking about are very useful bonus, but not the main purpose of the system. There are many more advantages (two useable frequencies significantly reducing propagation errors being one of the most important, or the more reasonable constellation) which make this system more unique for it's purpose.

No, I'm not a big fan of EU byrocracy. Projects within EU are in many cases useless and very cost ineffective. But nevertheless, it doesn't make Galileo one of them. Project management wise - possibly. Technologically - hell no.

[Phantomski]

Well I suppose, that discussions about adding P for all users and requested guarantees were unacceptable to US and building own system was cheaper and more sensible option. It's really not technically comparable, it's difference of generation. I fully agree current GPS services are more than acceptable to many uses, from hiking to field survey. It is NOT, however, enough for aviation. Not because of some stupid political decisions or useless rules and laws. It's just technically unsuitable, a showstopper.

[reynoldsno1]

That's why there are no GPS let downs authorised (well, not without other systems like baro altimeter or with quite a high minima) and why FMC automatically disregards GNSS position information in favor of IRS + ground external systems.

a stunning piece of information - maybe it's true in the UK, but there are hundreds (probably thousands) of GPS "letdowns" that have been in use over the past 15 years or so in countries that are not the UK- and there are IRSs that will align in flight using GPS reference...:ooh:

[Self Loading Freight]

It's a typical European private/public faff. The real reason that Galileo started is that it is politically embarrassing to rely on the US military for a key piece of infrastructure, especially now that GPS has developed into a system that can be denied to quite small geographic areas without affecting the rest. It's not as if it's unthinkable that EU and US would fall out to such an extent that this became a factor.

But it's impossible to sell a major project on that basis to all the European states, so it had to be set up as a commercial entity. That's clearly nonsense, as has become clear now the time has come to pass the collecting tin around.

Add to that the sheer impossibility of running a project of this nature as a consortium of nation states, and you end up with far too many impossible things to believe before breakfast.

If the EU had been honest from the outset about the reasons why Galileo was wanted, then the project would either have been killed or created as a sort of mini-Inmarsat - one company with one bank account, one set of managers and one task - and would have worked. Personally, I think that would have been well worth the investment: it's not as if the EU doesn't need to learn how do to this, if it's going to be an actor on equal terms with the other global power groups. I also think it would have been politically impossible, the way things are.

As it is, it's... the word that springs to mind is not one that would please Danny if it appeared here. But it is, well and truly.