• HERE COMES THE SUN!   SolarMin is upon us (one year late). The Solar Cycle. Plasma bubbles. Halloween 03. Scintillation and satellite positioning…

• By the way: How many Global Satellite Systems does the world really need?…

• Short History of “Orientation”… part II…

• Check out our new map: “Oil & Seismic Company Locator”… every company in the world! (please help us to improve it):

http://www.communitywalk.com/map/177479

• And of course all the News and Tips: seismic, survey, geodesy, and others…

• Also: your letters and suggestions ... 
 

HERE COMES THE SUN!

• In December 2006 many GPS receivers stopped working suddenly. The cause was a strong solar storm as described in: geocarta.blogspot.com

• Those storms are usually more common during the peaks of Solar Activity (SolarMax), but this one happened while we are getting towards a low (SolarMin), and in 2008 starts the next 11 years cycle of increased solar activity.

• Between 2010 and 2013 the number of solar storms will increase, dramatically affecting GPS (but also Glonass, Galileo or any other positioning and differential correction satellites, as well as power grids etc…). The effect will be felt strongly along the geomagnetic equator and in the polar regions.

• During the Halloween Storm of 2003, the GPS height determination capability of the WAAS system (used by the FAA) was worse than 50m – rendering it unusable for precision landing by commercial aircraft!:

 Click Here

Also: spacetoday.org

• Stay informed, this is the official NOAA solar cycle web site: www.swpc.noaa.gov

• “Plasma Bubbles” and scintillation compound the problems of ionospheric propagation under the tropic. Many sites monitor scintillation in real time: www.mssl.ucl.ac.uk

• Many Dynamically Positioned vessels operate near the equator (Brazil, West Africa...). Their class depends on the number of independent positioning systems onboard. In case of sun storm all satellite based systems could crash at the same time, making the vessel loose position. Hereunder an example of emergency quick disconnect (EQD) in 2002:

•<<The allowable time to initiate EQD is often very short. (...) The total available time is determined by the allowable offset and the speed of vessel/rig in loss of position scenarios.
The allowable offset is determined by water depth and riser lower/upper flex joint angle limitation. As an example, a standard drilling BOP and riser system may require that disconnect to be completed before lower flex joint angle reaches 8 degrees (...) We may assume that the time needed for the EQD process is within 30 s.Consequently, the allowable time for DP operator to assess the situation and initiate red status alarm, and afterwards driller pushes EQD buttons, will be around 40 seconds.>> (Cpt Harry Verhoeven et al).

• Systron Donner offers inertial technology industry wide:  www.tmworld.com

• The DARPA Urban Challenge will take place in Victorville, California at the site of the former George Air Force Base on November 3, 2007. The National Qualification Event will take place at the same location, October 26-31, 2007. (It is mostly an inertial navigation race).

•  Marines ship new Howitzer to Iraq. “It enhances accuracy and takes a lot of burden off of the units, because you have a howitzer now that can locate itself with an inertial map,” said Lewis Stough, M777 software test lead at the U.S. Army’s Picatinny Arsenal, N.J. “Units are able to be less dependent upon surveyors. Before, we would have one survey control point for a position, and you would have to have your position location based on that.”
marinecorpstimes.com

SURVEY NEWS

• Center of Earth located to 1mm/year: “Defining the translational velocity of the reference frame of Earth”. By Donald F. Argus. Geophysical Journal International:  www.blackwell-synergy.com

•  Effective November 1, 2007, the datum tag on the NGS geodetic control Data Sheet will be NAD 83 (NSRS2007) for control points that were part of this National readjustment. This change will impact the NAD 83 latitude and longitude and the NAVD 88 Helmert orthometric height fields by shifting them to the right five places: Click here

•  EU deadlocked over funding for Galileo satnav project: www.gpsdaily.com


•  India To Build Constellation Of Seven Navigation Satellites: www.gpsdaily.com


• Pedestrian Navigation System. In <<Adaptive Step Length Estimation Algorithm Using Low-Cost MEMS Inertial Sensors>>, researchers showed that the walking status of a subject could be measured in both indoor and outdoor environments even though step length varies considerably with the subject's speed and status. Using an Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) from Microinfinity, the MI-A3330LS-U, and a Bluetooth module, an adaptive algorithm performs different linear fits to recognize the movement status such as walking or running. The MEMS device consisted of an accelerometer and a gyroscope. The technique could be applied to personal health care monitors to calculate the energy expenditure of pedestrians
 

OIL, GAS & SEISMIC NEWS

• Windfall profits decree not nationalization. Ecuador. A decree signed by Ecuador's President Rafael Correa that increases the state's take of extraordinary oil company profits to 99% from 50% does not amount to nationalization (...):
bnamericas.com

• (10/5/2007) Noble Energy today followed yesterday's announcement of a discovery in Equatorial Guinea with word it has made another discovery off Cameroon...(OGI)

• Japex gearing up to drill offshore Philippines.
(10/5/2007) Japan Petroleum Exploration Company today advised it will commence drilling an exploration well in the Tanon Strait offshore the Philippines... (OGI)

• Schlumberger acquires minority stake in PetroMarker. (10/5/2007) Schlumberger said today it has acquired a minority interest in PetroMarker, a specialist in the development of marine electromagnetics technologies... (OGI)

Caricatures at: petroleumworld.com

OTHER NEWS

•  DOG OF WAR. This mechanized pack animal will follow soldiers wherever duty calls them… Click Here

• Nokia buys NavteQ (for how much?). “For handset makers, it's all about location”.
Click Here

• Having a small tie in real time is not as important as having a regular drift, even if this drift is larger, because it will compensate well at post-processing time.

• For example even if a tie is 12 feet after 1 or 2 miles, the adjusted 3D values of all the points will be at the 1.5 ft (1 sigma) level which is no different than an average RTK GPS survey (see studies in previous newsletters).

• A QC surveyor requesting small ties is actually inviting some inertial operators to tie in “loops”, which gives worse final results after processing than honest linear surveys with larger ties. Clients should educate their QC reps.

• The advantage of a seismic project surveyed with inertial systems is that the coordinates are those of the actual geophone or drill point, the stake was placed and surveyed at the exact location it will be drilled or recorded (no line of sight restriction, no "let me get the shot, then move the stake").

• To better understand why real-time stake out accuracy is not nearly as important as final coordinates, see the latest AAPG "Explorer":
Explorer 

 • Ultra accurate INS surveys in our next Newsletter...

1.  Would replacing the aluminum with Kevlar or other material reduce the weight of the pack.
2. How can we improve the comfort of the harness. (the central foot will be flush with the pack in the future)
3. Can we wash the harnesses. (Yes, learn to connect and disconnect them. Wash them regularly)
4. Can you add a screen with a map in the background. Make it compatible with Arcview.
5. Can you add the function “Create a point” in the offset screen (based on pre-known offsets, create a target source point and bring it to “Compass Forward” screen)
6. Could we create a daily “Job File” in the morning containing the start point, the preplot for that day of work and all the tie (Control) points involved.
7. Would you gain weight by using smaller or different feet.
8.  Could you compute the Julian date and show it in the “Job Info” screen to better name the daily files.
9. You should put highly reflective tape and a radio pouch on the front straps of the harness.
10. Before creating a new file (automatically) could you offer a “confirm screen”, in case it was just the date and time that were off in the Recon…

• Robert H. Goddard didn’t develop the modern rocket for trivial reasons, but for the specific purpose he had all his life of facilitating human trips to Mars (after the moon). Consistently ridiculed by the media before WWII, he continued his work with the support of Charles Lindberg and the Guggenheim family.

• Wernher Von Braun, in Nazi Germany tried to learn everything he could from Goddard’s research through the media and later via secret service operations. Until 1939, they actually had regular phone conversations about liquid propellants and other rocketry questions. Von Braun had been inspired by Hermann Oberth born in Transylvania who himself was a fan of Jules Vernes’ space fictions.
• Von Braun was an SS officer, and concentration camp slave labor was used to build V2 rockets during world war II. Von Braun historically declared his private opposition to both situations. A “prussian” aristocrat he was at one time arrested by the Gestapo.

• The inertial system used in the V2 rockets was somewhat inaccurate, and mostly based on a longitudinal accelerometer whose data was compensated for vertical acceleration and gravity. Transversal readings were done by a gyroscope. Lateral velocities were missing.

• in 1945 Von Braun and many German scientists were transferred to the USA to work on rocket programs. Information about the development of inertial systems was classified.
 

• In July 1955 a team of French engineers (Schnerb, Carpentier, Boucq etc…) visited those companies as well as Litton (who had an INS named LN33A), and established lasting technical ties between US and French companies such as Sagem.

• In 1960 Rudolph Kalman from MIT then Columbia, describes the “KF”. The Kalman filter is an efficient recursive filter that estimates the state of a dynamic system from a series of incomplete and noisy measurements

• In the 1960s, when France became a nuclear power then withdrew from NATO it had to develop its own inertial navigation systems based on this experience, since direct cooperation with America was stopped.

• Sagem in cooperation with Ferranti (UK) developed the inertial system SF500-AE51 for the Concord(e) supersonic civilian airliner starting in 1965.

• In October 1973 both the French and US navy were experimenting Kalman Filtering for the alignment of their INS platforms. Pierre Faurre and Rudolph Kalman proposed a cooperation that was rejected. The first French aircraft using the new platform was the Super Etendard based in Landivisiau, Fr.

• In 1978 the decision by Boeing to install Honeywell strapdown inertial systems based on laser gyros on all Boeing 757 and 767 shook up the inertial world and woke up the manufacturers to the coming of age of strapdown Inertial Navigation Systems.

 •After the cold war in the 1990s, strapdown, and therefore man-portable inertial navigation systems were made available to the civilian survey market.

• In 1955 a series of articles by P.J. Klass in “Aviation Week” described to the public the possibility to navigate airplanes for hours by using accurate INS systems based on floating gyroscopes such as those developed by American companies Honeywell and Kearfott. The same technology was used in ballistic missiles.

The rest of the world…

Virtus establishes MEMS partnership in Japan

smalltimes.com

Graphically cool site of the month (high speed connection): rainmaker.com (choose: demo reels / visual effects (for Zorba’s music…)

www.epsg.org