Last Saturday, the US and its allies fired over 110 Tomahawk missiles at targets in Libya. Tomahawks are equipped with GPS satellite navigation systems. GPS signals transmitted with low energy from distant satellites are susceptible to interference, according to Technology Review.
signal interference
The disruption of GPS signals is operated by North Korea as well as by truck drivers, white Technology Review. “A 1-kilowatt cell phone jammer can block a military GPS receiver 80 kilometers away, and a Russian company recently launched a 4-kilowatt jammer that allows for standard GPS signals within 200 kilometers.” Although GPS signals are disturbing, Tomahawks are not affected. They have a second position finding system: Terrain Contour Matching, TERCOM for short. Through a radar system, TERCOM detects the terrain it flies and compares it with a stored map
Old technologies
A system like TERCOM is difficult to disturb, even if the radar system interferes. Also, the system is equipped with an older navigation technology, INS (Interial Navigation System), which relies on dead reckoning. The location of a moving object is determined by measurements of speed, direction of movement and time.
The interesting thing about the two older technologies is that they rely on computerized navigation methods when communicating with satellites.
Target can not be missed
However, modern ockets had another navigation system that promised maximum precision just before reaching the target: Digital Scene Matching Area Correlation (DSMAC). In the process, a stored image with the target is compared with the actual target. “(Red)