Regional airline schedules were disrupted late Saturday and into Sunday by ADS-B and GPS issues that seemed to affect mainly Bombardier CRJ aircraft. According to various sources, the disruption briefly grounded entire fleets of regional jets and the resulting delays and cancellations rippled through the system. A random selection of airport arrival and departure boards showed most flights on time by midafternoon EDT on Sunday, except for some weather delays in the Southeast.
The origin of the issues remains unclear but affected the ADS-B and GNSS systems on the affected aircraft. Mainline aircraft seemed to be unaffected by the problems. The problems seemed confined to the western U.S. and the FAA reportedly asked the military to cease any GPS jamming tests they might be conducting.
Sounds like the shutdown of the loran system and lack of any other backup to the GPS system is starting to bite the FAA in the behind. The FAA may need rethink their VOR and radar shutdown plans. Can you say “request heading direct”?
“The problems seemed confined to the western U.S. and the FAA reportedly asked the military to cease any GPS jamming tests they might be conducting.”
That is interesting, the FAA and the military not working together during the military GPS jamming tests. Typical government “cooperation” with public/civilian operations footing the bill financially and potentially safety-wise.
This had nothing to do with GPS jamming by the military but this response is typical of our FAA and their lack of knowledge as to Space weather issues.
This weekend, One of the largest CME, (Coronal Mass Ejections) from the sun hit earth directed early Friday night around 7 PM pacific Time and its effects did not subside until mid morning on Sunday June 9th.
The majority of the effect of this CME was to the Western and in particular the Pacific Northwest US and the northern pacific region stretching from Japan and the PNW.
VHF frequencies were being heard between the western US and Japan during this CME event.
Consumer GPS devices in motor vehicles and in Public safety radios in and around Oregon were reported to be either essentially dead or intermittent during the entire friday night to early sunday CME event.
If the FAA had a clue as to Space weather forecast and the effects of CME’s on GPS then they would have know about this earth directed event and they would have published a notice about ithe potential for GPS outages but I guess the FAA space weather forecast division, if one even exists, only works 9-5 and not on weekends.