Queen Elizabeth Prize for Engineering for GPS pioneers
This year’s £1m QE Engineering Prize has been won by four individuals who played key roles in developing GPS. The Americans Brad Parkinson, James Spilker Jr, Hugo Fruehauf, and Richard Schwartz were all present at the London ceremony held to announce the honour.
Dr Parkinson said it …

Lockheed Martin looking forward to explore GPS III capabilities
Lockheed Martin launched its first GPS III satellite and confirms that the unit is communicating efficiently with ground-control operators.
The GPS III program involves new ground stations and new, higher-power satellites, with additional navigation signals for both civilian and military users, and aims to improve the …

Dr Gladys West inducted into Air Force Pioneers Hall of Fame

An 87-year-old doctor whose programming of accurate earth models led to the current GPS system has been inducted into the Air Force Space and Missile Pioneers Hall of Fame. Dr. Gladys West was presented with the Air Force Space and Missile Pioneers award for her …

FCC approves use of Galileo GNSS in the US
The FCC has granted in part the European Commission’s request for a waiver of Commission rules so that nonfederal devices in the US may access specific signals transmitted from the Galileo. While private users were free to use the European GNSS, with this ruling entity such as …

Dr Yu Jiao receives Parkinson Award
The Institute of Navigation’s (ION) Satellite Division presented Dr. Yu Jiao with its Bradford W. Parkinson Award on September 28, 2018 at the ION GNSS+ Conference (Miami, Florida).
Dr. Jiao was recognized for graduate student excellence in Global Navigation Satellite Systems in her thesis, “Low- Latitude Ionospheric Scintillation Signal …

USAF Announces selection of GPS III follow-on contract
The U.S. Air Force announced selection of Lockheed Martin for a fixed-price-type production contract for 22 GPS III Follow- On satellites with a total estimated contract value up to $7.2 billion.
The Air Force operates a total of 77 satellites vital to US national security that provide …

eSIM OTA test solution verification supports ERA-GLONASS
All new vehicles in the Euroasian Economic Union (EAEU) must be equipped with the ERA-GLONASS emergency calling system. Certification for these eCall systems is based on the Russian GOST R System specifications, where GOST 33470 covers the test methods for wireless communication modules of in-vehicle emergency call devices …

Beidou’s third-generation satellite navigation makes a splash
More than 40,000 fishing boats in China have been equipped with receivers tuned to China’s Beidou Navigation Satellite System, to provide better search and rescue for ships in trouble, a Beidou expert said. “Fishers call the Beidou system their patron,” Yang Yuanxi, an academician with the Chinese Academy …

Russia launches Glonass-M navigation satellite
Russia has launched a Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket from the Plesetsk space center to orbit a Glonass-M satellite, the Russian Defense Ministry said.
“The middle-class Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket launched on June 17 from the Plesetsk space center (Arkhangelsk Region) successfully put the Russian navigation Glonass-M spacecraft to the designated orbit.” Earlier, …

Stanford aero/astro professor Per Enge, expert in GPS, dies at 64

Per K. Enge, the Vance D. and Arlene C. Coffman Professor in the School of Engineering and one of the world’s foremost experts in global positioning system (GPS) technologies, died April 22 at his home in Mountain View, California. He was 64.
Enge, a …