An experimental satellite has mapped the scale of GPS jamming in Europe and the Middle East from space for the first time.
The data surprised the team behind the project and indicated that satellites orbiting away from Earth They are not alone in experiencing degradation in their position, navigation and timing (PNT) signals, which can affect their performance and the safety of their operations.
The new measurements were made by Pulsar-0, the first satellite of the novel Pulsar Navigation constellation developed by California-based Zona Space Systems. The experimental satellite orbits 310 miles (500 kilometers) above Earth, testing Zona’s technology before the company deploys its navigation constellation of 300 spacecraft. low earth orbit (LEO) later this year.
Pulsar Group aims to provide a more flexible PNT service than the United States GPS networks and other global navigation satellite systems (GNSS), such as Europe Galileo or from china Beidou. PNT signals delivered by GNSS satellites underpin many of the systems on which our civilization depends in everyday life, including the operation of power grids, finance operations, and oil drilling.
But because GNSS satellites orbit so far from Earth – at altitudes above 12,000 miles (19,000 km) – the signal that ground-based receivers detect is weak and can easily be jammed.
GNSS is jammed (predominance of GNSS signals with noise) and spoofing (which involves overriding original signals with false signals having incorrect coordinates), has become almost a global emergency over the past five years.
For example, Russian jammers are officially disrupting GNSS signals on Russia’s western borders to protect the country from Ukrainian drone attacks. Every month, this interference affects thousands of flights flying in the area. Warring parties in the Middle East also use jamming and spoofing to prevent drone attacks and disguise their positions. illegal ship at sea.
To provide greater resilience against such deliberate interference, Zona’s satellites will use a similar signal, but one that will be 100 times stronger. But the Pulsar-0 spacecraft also carries a GPS receiver to ensure that both systems will be able to work together. When the Zona team first turned on that receiver a few months after Pulsar-0’s launch last year, they were shocked by the scale of signal degradation the receiver was reporting over parts of Europe and the Middle East.
“For example, when we fly over North America, we see a beautiful signal all the time,” Zona co-founder Kaz Gunning told Space.com. “But as soon as we started doing any operations over Europe, we saw that there was really something going on there. We thought we were going to see some jams, but it’s a lot more than we expected.”
In the most affected areas, GPS signal strength dropped from the regular 40 decibels to 10 decibels at satellite altitude.
Gunning says that, due to the altitude of the Pulsar-0 satellite, the map may not truthfully reflect where jamming is worst for users on the ground. However, data has shown that satellites in heavily used LEO suffer from some degree of GPS signal interference from France in the west to the borders of Pakistan in the east.
The measurements mean that satellites in LEO are not out of reach of ground-based jammers, and PNT signals cannot always be relied upon requiring those satellites to time-sync their operations and determine their position in space.
“As you go through these areas, your GPS capability goes away,” Gunning said. “This can be a problem for imaging satellites that are trying to position themselves to take pictures of a certain area. You can’t determine altitude, you can’t make position determinations without a GPS signal. You can’t even accurately point your telecom command antenna at the ground. That’s generally going to disrupt satellite operations.”
Satellite constellations like SpaceX starlink They also rely on GPS to avoid collisions with other spacecraft.
It is not just deliberate jamming and spoofing that can damage precious PNT signals. severe solar stormCan also cause serious disruption. Gannon Superstorm For example, in May 2024, GNSS signals were so distorted that precision agricultural machinery in parts of the US could not operate for several days. So technologists are racing to find backup solutions to deliver the PNT signal to everyone who needs it if the GNSS is down.
Zona hopes that the Pulsar constellation, once up and running, will make life much easier for people who depend on GNSS.
Gunning says that, with the improved strength of the PNT signal transmitted by the company’s planned LEO constellation, existing jammers will only be able to affect about 5% of the area they can currently disrupt.
“The impact of the congestion is going to be limited to a smaller radius,” Gunning said. “The erosion area will be reduced, and the scope of the complete lockdown will also be reduced.”
Zona plans to launch a batch of six satellites in October and ramp up production soon after. The company raised $170 million in a “Series C” funding round this March and expects to begin providing basic service in early 2027.
“We expect early timekeeping customers to begin using Pulsar with intermittent coverage later this year,” said Max Younis, head of communications at Zona. space.com. “Pulsar’s capabilities will grow with every next launch, opening up new advantages for new customer segments as our fleet fills out.”
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