"Tom Francis" wrote in message
...
Well, after investigating a little, visiting the newsgroup that RG
suggested and talking to a CG MSO this morning when I went down to New
London for a sea trial, it appears there are several factors
contributing to this.

1 - There are apparently three birds in the Northern satellite
constellation that are experiencing service outages - the problems are
intermittent and while these birds are due for replacement in upcoming
months, keeping them running is a hit or miss proposition.

2 - Add to this the CG, NASA, NOAA and Air Force are performing GPS
Satellite interference tests all this month and this year in selected
areas of the country. In theory, this is supposed to end in the NE
part of the country by October 13th.

3 - There is some low level solar flare activity that is causing
signal fade and minor corrections in satellite orbits which brings
them down temporarily.

4 - The Air Force has been screwing around with some air defense
radars along the East Coast that are close in wave length to that used
by the GPS constellation although this has been limited if only
because of the effect it has on local communications.

5 - Air Force has been testing the intentional error software in the
Northern Constellation.

6 - RFI/EMI from appliances that theoretically have FCC approval, but
have manufacturing tolerance problems.

So to put paid to all this, it's a combination of technical issues, it
is real, but very intermittent and certain receivers are more
susceptible to the problem than others - depends on how the software
is written, how sensitive the receiver is and receiver antenna
location. Also the further North you are, the worse it becomes when
it does happen.

Pretty cool huh?

You missed the obvious.
It's all Bush's fault.

Eisboch