Russia to Put 8 CDMA Signals on 4 GLONASS Frequencies

[Corrected March 20] Russia is “close to completion” of a coordination plan for the “whole set of GLONASS signals” that will include eight different CDMA signals on four frequencies, according to Prof. Grigoriy Stupak, deputy director general of the Russian Institute of Space Device Engineering (RISDE) and the general designer for the GLONASS system.

Delays Continue to Plague Europe's Galileo GNSS Program

At this week’s (March 9–11) Munich Satellite Navigation Summit, Galileo program officials — public and private — acknowledged that it faces delays at both ends of its latest schedule.

At the near end, the lead contractor for the Galileo in-orbit validation (IOV) satellites that it is building with a consortium of companies said the first IOV will not launch in 2010 as per the most recent schedule. Instead, said Mike Healy, director of navigation for EADS Astrium, the satellite will not be ready for launch until probably February 2011.

GPS Jamming and Interference Sparks UK Concerns, Technical Solutions

The noise floor seems to be rising on the subject of GNSS vulnerability to  jamming and interference. Recently, the United Kingdom provided the locus for a trio of initiatives that reflect growing anxieties about the widespread global dependence of critical position, navigation, and timing (PNT) applications and infrastructures on the low-power signals from space.

Russia Launches 3 GLONASS-M Satellites

[Updated 03:35 GMT, March 2] Russian Space Forces successfully launched three GLONASS satellites from the Baikonur launch site in Kazakhstan on March 2, at 00:19 Moscow time (22:19 GMT, March 1).

The launch had been postponed from last September after an anomaly was discovered in one of the on-orbit space vehicles (SVs) navigation payload.

Raytheon Wins $1.5-Billion GPS OCX Contract

Officials from the Space and Missile Systems Center’s Global Positioning Systems Wing announced today (February 25) the award of the Next Generation GPS Control Segment (OCX) contract to Raytheon Company, Intelligence & Information Systems, Aurora, Colorado.

With a baseline duration of 73 months, the OCX development contract has option years for sustainment worth a potential total of $1,535,147,916. Raytheon teammates include Boeing, ITT, Braxton Technologies, Infinity Systems Engineering, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

President Proposes $1.23 Billion for GPS in FY 2011 Budget

President Obama’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2011 (FY11) would allocate $1.057 billion for Department of Defense (DoD) GPS-related procurement and development activities and nearly $180 million to the Department of Transportation (DoT) for civil GPS programs.

NASA's New Solar Observatory May Lead to Better Forecasting of Space Weather Events

An Atlas 5 rocket sent NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) up on February 11 on an $850 million, five-year mission to find out more about the sun’s magnetic field activity and space weather and, hopefully, to improve forecasting enough to make it possible to safeguard GPS and other technologies.

First GPS Block IIF Satellite Moves to Cape Canaveral: Launch Window Opens Mid-May

[updated Februaary 16] The first Block IIF satellite is undergoing final launch preparations after arriving at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida aboard a Boeing-built C-17 Globemaster III airlifter.

Space Vehicle 1 (SV-1), the first of 12 GPS IIF satellites for the U.S. Air Force, will lift off on a United Launch Alliance Delta IV vehicle later this year, with the first launch window in mid-May.

GLONASS Gets Its Groove Back — 19 Satellites on the Air

[UPDATED Feb. 8, 2010] The Russian GNSS system, GLONASS, has brought its contingent of transmitting satellites back up to 19, as spacecraft launched in December and others off-line for maintenance have returned to healthy status.

Meanwhile,  Voice of Russia, the Russian government's international radio broadcasting service, has reported that a monitoring station is being established at the Russian Antarctic outpost of Bellingshausen to track GLONASS  satellites. The orbital planes in the constellation are oriented so that GLONASS spacecraft pass over higher latitudes in the northern and southern hemispheres than do the other GNSS systems.

ESA, Industry Sign Galileo FOC Contracts

René Oosterlinck, the European Space Agency’s director of the Galileo program and navigation-related activities, and company representative signed the first three contracts for the Galileo full operational capability (FOC) phase on January 26. The event marks the official start of building the Galileo operational infrastructure.