Union Minister of Civil Aviation, Shri P. Ashok Gajapathi Raju has formally launched the GAGAN system (GPS AIDED GEO AUGMENTED NAVIGATION) for aircraft augmentation. GAGAN is a joint effort of Airport Authority of India (AAI) and Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).
FEATURES
1) India is one of the few countries with space based satellite navigation services to the aviation sector.
2) Range of augmentation service for GPS would be over the country, Bay of Bengal, South East Asia and Middle East expanding up to Africa.
3) Aircraft equipped with the Satellite Based Augmentation System (SBAS) will be able to use GAGAN signal in Indian airspace for en route navigation.
4) The SBAS consists of 15 Indian Reference Stations, three Geo Stationary Navigation Payload in C and L bands and with all the associated software and communication links.
5) GAGAN is the first SBAS in the world certified for Approach with Vertical Guidance operating in the Equatorial Ionospheric region and the third SBAS to have achieved this feat, after WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System) of USA and EGNOS(European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service) of Europe.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
1) The reference stations pick up signals from the orbiting GPS satellites.
2) The measurements are immediately passed on to the mission control centers that then work out the necessary corrections that must be made.
3) Messages carrying those corrections are sent via the uplink stations to the satellites in geostationary orbit that have the GAGAN payload.
4) The satellites then broadcast the messages. The SBAS receivers use those messages and apply the requisite corrections to the GPS signals thereby establishing their position with considerable accuracy.
Author: Palak Tiwari, a freelancer writer based in Bhopal
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