Image: RNT Foundation
In September we reported how airline and pilot groups had raised the issue of GNSS disruption to the UN’s International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
The body decided it was an urgent issue (airplanes have almost crashed because of GNSS disruption, after all) and decided to act promptly.
The result was a letter to member states published today
Subject: Strengthening of communications, navigation, and surveillance (CNS) systems resilience and mitigation of interference to global navigation satellite system (GNSS)
Action required: Note the criticality of the issue and the importance of action by States to address it by making use of the ICAO guidance provided in Doc 9849, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Manual and by taking any other measures as appropriate…
A few thoughts before you get too discouraged about how long it took for ICAO to act:
- ICAO is an international body and they can’t do anything quickly.
- The only real power ICAO has is to bring nations together to talk and provide them information. It can’d to much more than inform. For things to happen, nations have to start changing the way they do business.
- Most all the member states had all the information already. This is just nudging them to act in ways they already know they should.
- The list of things ICAO recommends nations do is a pretty good one. If any nations pay attention and do some or all they will be better off than before.
- When we do have a major air crash because of GNSS disruption this will be a list of good practices for people to look at and adopt to help prevent it happening again.
