Russians playing games with their jammers (believed)
 

GPS jamming has been ramping up in the area around Finland/Estonia etc in recent times both for civ and mil aircraft. Now in the week it has stopped nighttime landings into EETU and return to base by a couple (so far admitted) Finnair flights. A few differences in the details as reported as to whether the jamming occurred in flight/en route or in landing.

https://news.err.ee/1609326360/secon...s-interference

GPS jamming and spoofing in the Baltic is not new and even becomes a standard nowadays . what is new is the combined introduction of RNP App with Remote tower ops and downgrading ATC for FIS in that airport .
All 3 to save costs of course .

Indeed, the difference in this case is apparently "no GPS guide=no land" at EETU. It is not an airport I am familiar with and neither do I need to sit in the big seat with all the responsibility.

Our news generally has been full of regular jamming stories, mostly by the beastly Russians and not by the brave NATO forces when doing a few mil exercises up north though - they were NOTAMed :)

I do not claim specialist knowledge on the remote ATC, and no doubt it is all good and dandy until a problem occurs and then "oh..."

No ILS available? How about NPA, or visual? I mean, the Russians can bring traffic to a complete stop??

Remote ATC and nearby Russians seems to be the flavour of this different article. https://news.err.ee/1609326783/exper...tion-not-found

The airport has basically no real traffic aside from this Finnair flight. The other traffic is general aviation and mostly school flights of the Estonian Aviation Academy. There is no real reason to have an ILS system and tower services in place, it does not make financial sense. The charts still list ILS available for RW26 but GNSS is required for initial approach and missed approach. Without radar control to replace those parts with vectors, not too many options left. No other NPA approaches available.

In recently published maps regarding GPS interference reports, there were none over Tartu, but some just North/Northwest of Tartu, pretty much where the flight diverted. It is likely the crew encountered the interference in flight, had no RAIM prediction anymore and possibly that prohibits them from performing the RNP. I do not know the procedures at Finnair, but more and more operators prohibit visuals at night nowadays.

If I had the fuel and nothing in my manuals to prohibit it, I would have likely continued on a bit further to see if the interference passes. It has been quite localized around Estonia and Helsinki (over the Gulf of Finland, over and around Amari airbase mostly). Usually you pass through the affected area pretty quickly.

Should be able to navigate to ERULI with raw data (D10.6 IUM on the LOC), the missed approach to NIVER could be promulgated by NOTAM to follow the back course of the ILS to 2000 ft, and hold on a DME/LOC fix at the same position as NIVER.

Satnav corrections
 

Precise nav is affected as corrections for L1L2 are affected. Galileo, Glosnass and GPS are still active but their corrections are in error. This is what we experienced N of Gydinia, Poland on 27, 28 April.

I guess Finnair must have had its reasons to not undertake the advice given above, whether the decision was made solely by the pilot in charge, or in conjunction with the company's security and operations teams i don't know. Finnair generally does not seem/feel to be so risk sensitive (not a complaint, and I trust their professionalism to the best of my knowledge versus what might appear "cowboy" behaviour by some other carriers outside of the EU).

Finnair have pulled the flights for now: https://yle.fi/a/74-20086338 https://news.err.ee/1609328058/finna...mming-solution

... and they analyze to use non-RNP approaches.

Huge spoofing over the Black sea as well for me last night. Never seen this level so far.

Yes, one of our tabloids reports today jamming games affecting EFHK-EFJO (very close to our friendly neighbour in the east).

The article's headline said that the captain's "solution" was a victory or honour flight over Karelia :)

Link: in Finnish https://www.iltalehti.fi/kotimaa/a/c...9-c61b4ab910e4

Translation of the first part:
Finnair's Tuesday morning flight from Helsinki to Joensuu had to make an extra turn due to GPS jamming in Russia. The flight in question departed at 9.05 am.
Sirri Rimppi, a reporter for Iltalehti, reports that the aircraft made an extra circuit over Joensuu before landing.
- The captain announced to the passengers that "we were doing a lap of honour over Karelia," Rimppi says.
- According to the captain, Russia, our neighbour to the east, caused a disturbance and for a moment it looked as if we would not be able to land in Joensuu. Then he said that the disturbance had cleared during the turn. The aircraft landed successfully at Joensuu airport.


So I guess the games will keep on going, just like a tired toddler making a noise for attention and being a brat, Vlad's workers are continuing their games.

GPS spoofing to protect military operations is to be expected. But you can't just turn on the jammers on the eve of an attack or you'll give away the game. So, random incidents at various times and places so the opposition won't know when its the "real thing".

That's my guess.

Yeah, of course other countries do GPS jamming and no doubt send fake traffic also at times in general to confuse those monitoring the elint.

https://spectrum.ieee.org/faa-files-...arys-gps-tests

GPS jamming and sometimes spoofing has always been going on close to any conflict area.
Airports needs to have ground based approach equipment to ensure the traffic for sure..

eLoran is the answer to GPS jamming. But brings its own problems...

Get a navigator and go………like the good ol days before this new fangled GPS stuff….i’m sure a B17 in WW2 could have found it…

Perhaps try and get rid of the regimes that use jamming as a weapon of mischief.

It is played by both sides, as the main use is against drones , the US and Israel and playing with it as much as Russia. We civilians are just collateral damage.. The price to pay to fly near conflict zones.