Selective Availability Reinstated?

[teppupkcos]

This morning, during a search for a geocache (GCYH63) I found myself in the middle of a 4 lane highway. While I've experienced inaccuracy before, this was obviously no place for a cache. After checking for culverts, I gave up and went out to eat. When I got to **removed by moderator**, I noticed that my GPS was 893 feet off. I didn't think much of it until i got home and noticed that i was off by 902 feet.

I started to wonder what the possible cause of this could be. I called a friend of mine from college (he was in electrical engineering). He checked his GPS (same as mine) and confirmed an error of 865 feet. This scared him enough that he quickly made some calls to some of his buddies from the military. Now, he won't tell me exactly, but the US may be preparing an attack on a foreign country. He said it wasn't a world power, but he refused to elaborate further.

I don't know where to go with this so i'm asking you. My brother was recently deployed to a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I've emailed him, but haven' heard anything back yet. As he is really good with responding promptly, this has me worried.

Has anyone else experienced large errors with their GPS?

[+RussellM]

You know, my dad mentioned that his GPS was "way off". I don't know what he meant by way off, but it's a possibility. Let me know what you figure out.

[Motorcycle_Mama]

I'm sure everything will be back to normal tomorrow.

 

Please.

 

SA was permanently discontinued by the US government in September 2007.

[+Pat in Louisiana]

I made a note at a cache I found today around 3:30 CST that the coords were off about 50 feet.

I just went out and checked against a known point and my Legend was showing 198' from point?

The Satellite page shows +/- 15 ft.

I don't know what to make of this.

[+WaylessWood]

Seems everything is already back to normal... assuming it ever wasn't

 

I'm sitting in my living room away from windows and such and have better than 25ft accuracy, which is quite normal.

 

April Fools Detector is off the charts though

[+Pat in Louisiana]

Mine shows +/- 15' but if I go to the corner with it, it shows I am one block over on the next corner or about 300 feet off?

[+Pat in Louisiana]

I just created a waypoint in my driveway and downloaded it to ExpertGps. The map shows I'm on a rooftop several houses away?

[+NVRDUNN]

This morning, during a search for a geocache (GCYH63) I found myself in the middle of a 4 lane highway. While I've experienced inaccuracy before, this was obviously no place for a cache. After checking for culverts, I gave up and went out to eat. When I got to **removed by moderator**, I noticed that my GPS was 893 feet off. I didn't think much of it until i got home and noticed that i was off by 902 feet.

I started to wonder what the possible cause of this could be. I called a friend of mine from college (he was in electrical engineering). He checked his GPS (same as mine) and confirmed an error of 865 feet. This scared him enough that he quickly made some calls to some of his buddies from the military. Now, he won't tell me exactly, but the US may be preparing an attack on a foreign country. He said it wasn't a world power, but he refused to elaborate further.

I don't know where to go with this so i'm asking you. My brother was recently deployed to a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I've emailed him, but haven' heard anything back yet. As he is really good with responding promptly, this has me worried.

Has anyone else experienced large errors with their GPS?

 

If this indeed true, I did find that a bird was taken offline a couple of days ago that could affecting GPS coverage in some areas according to this map:

 

http://gps.afspc.af.mil/gpsoc/archive/prod...s_world_dop.jpg

 

Parent link: http://gps.afspc.af.mil/gpsoc/advisories.aspx

[+root1657]

Hi, GPS engineer here.

 

Nothing to worry about. While it is true that selective availability was 'turned off' to allow civilians a fully accurate signal, it is still an option for the miitary to turn it back on to deny 'the opposition' the benifit of our own systems when we face them. That being said, there is another important detail, and that is that the selective availability option can be controlled regionally, so in the event they ever do that, the effect should be 'localized' in the area of interest.

 

I would suspect that what you noticed was probably more of a regular old error. Any number of things could have been out of whack with the 24+2 satellites that could account for the error. This does happen from time to time, and if you think aboutit, geocachers are probably one of the groups most likely to notice, because there are always some of us somewhere out looking at the GPS, and comparing it to known locations. Pilots (aircraft and boats) might be the other likely groups, except that when they get close enough to something to notice, the are usually not looking at the GPS anymore, but would probably tend to be looking out the window since both groups tend to put themselves in thier parking spots visually.

 

They would hesitate to degrade on purpose without a reason, so if it isnt on CNN within the hour, then it's probably just broke.

[Dinoprophet]

I'd be thoroughly disappointed in our military if they would so blatantly broadcast an imminent attack. Unless the attack happened simultaneously with the return of SA, I'd say no.

[Motorcycle_Mama]

http://aero-defense.ihs.com/news/dod-gps-selective.htm

 

http://www.govtech.com/em/150196

[+smithdk]

I justed checked my unit with a known waypoint that I set a while back and it is fine here on the gulfcoast of Mississippi.

[+RussellM]

I just checked, and mine's back to normal. Has anyone else checked?

[+Vinny & Sue Team]

This morning, during a search for a geocache (GCYH63) I found myself in the middle of a 4 lane highway. While I've experienced inaccuracy before, this was obviously no place for a cache. After checking for culverts, I gave up and went out to eat. When I got to **removed by moderator**, I noticed that my GPS was 893 feet off. I didn't think much of it until i got home and noticed that i was off by 902 feet.

I started to wonder what the possible cause of this could be. I called a friend of mine from college (he was in electrical engineering). He checked his GPS (same as mine) and confirmed an error of 865 feet. This scared him enough that he quickly made some calls to some of his buddies from the military. Now, he won't tell me exactly, but the US may be preparing an attack on a foreign country. He said it wasn't a world power, but he refused to elaborate further.

I don't know where to go with this so i'm asking you. My brother was recently deployed to a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I've emailed him, but haven' heard anything back yet. As he is really good with responding promptly, this has me worried.

Has anyone else experienced large errors with their GPS?

We just went outside and tested our two Magellan SportTrak Pro GPS receivers and our Explorist 100, and all are showing errors on known waypoints of from 599 feet to 993 feet. So, I just tried calling a geocacher friend of ours who works for the federal government in a GIS capacity; he has a top-secret security clearance. He was very close-lipped, but confirmed that SA was activated today and that there is something afoot, but he said that he could not tell me more.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

APRIL FOOLS!

Edited April 2, 2008 by Vinny & Sue Team

[+benh57]

Wow, these forums are easy to troll. Not a one of the first 10 posters knows what today's date is?

 

(hint, the month name starts with A, and its the first day in it)

 

Do you know how many civilian life-critical services depend on SA being off? Turing SA back on would be an economic disaster, it is off permanently.

[+Pat in Louisiana]

SA on or off, I don't know.

All I know is it took a lot longer to find a cache today and my GPS was way off in relation to known locations.

[+Stunod]

Wow, these forums are easy to troll. Not a one of the first 10 posters knows what today's date is?

 

Post 3 (and 5) called them out...

Edited April 2, 2008 by Stunod

[Motorcycle_Mama]

Wow, these forums are easy to troll. Not a one of the first 10 posters knows what today's date is?

 

(hint, the month name starts with A, and its the first day in it)

 

Yeah, which part of "I'm sure everything will be back to normal tomorrow." was confusing?

 

Edited April 2, 2008 by Motorcycle_Mama

[+WRITE SHOP ROBERT]

This morning, during a search for a geocache (GCYH63) I found myself in the middle of a 4 lane highway. While I've experienced inaccuracy before, this was obviously no place for a cache. After checking for culverts, I gave up and went out to eat. When I got to **removed by moderator**, I noticed that my GPS was 893 feet off. I didn't think much of it until i got home and noticed that i was off by 902 feet.

I started to wonder what the possible cause of this could be. I called a friend of mine from college (he was in electrical engineering). He checked his GPS (same as mine) and confirmed an error of 865 feet. This scared him enough that he quickly made some calls to some of his buddies from the military. Now, he won't tell me exactly, but the US may be preparing an attack on a foreign country. He said it wasn't a world power, but he refused to elaborate further.

I don't know where to go with this so i'm asking you. My brother was recently deployed to a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I've emailed him, but haven' heard anything back yet. As he is really good with responding promptly, this has me worried.

Has anyone else experienced large errors with their GPS?

What was **removed by moderator**?

 

Address? Business name? Church name? Cache name? Secret military location name?

 

Why **removed by moderator**?

 

Commercial? Private? Top secret? Religious? Spoiler?

 

 

How about...**commercial business name removed by moderator**?

Edited April 2, 2008 by WRITE SHOP ROBERT

[+WRITE SHOP ROBERT]

Maybe that's why I found a coin in a Cache today that was supposed to be in another nearby Cache. Did I go to the wrong one because the gps was 1/2 mile off?

[+carleenp]

This forum has no moderator editingabalizer--removabiltizing features. What are you talking about?

 

Or do you mean **removed by moderator** because they can do that!

Edited April 2, 2008 by carleenp

[+Confucius' Cat]

I just saw the local news report of a top secret operation going on in Indianapolis right now. The reporterette said a scud missile had landed on Monument Circle and had been fired from Iran. Military personnel from Fort Benjamin Harrison had been at the site all day attempting to disarm the missile.

 

The latest news was that it had been targeted for a synagogue in Iraq but had gone off course because of the selective availability.

 

The reporterette said she didn't think it was nukeler, but here only experience with nukes was she had a glow-in-the-dark watch once, so she's not really a very reliable source. (Then the fact that she works for a mainstream news media outlet should have tipped you off to that anyway.)

[+Vinny & Sue Team]

Wow, these forums are easy to troll. Not a one of the first 10 posters knows what today's date is?

 

Post 3 (and 5) called them out...

Even though I "got it" the second I saw the forum thread header, and before even opening the thread, I enjoyed this one immensely! It was a great concept!

[+WRITE SHOP ROBERT]

This forum has no moderator editingabalizer--removabiltizing features. What are you talking about?

 

Or do you mean **removed by moderator** because they can do that!

Just wishing more detail were provided as to the content and reason for removal. the moderation seems to be rather willy nilly at times. There are plenty of forum topics that mention business by name, but for some reason (or no reason at all) it appears that a business name has been removed by a moderator with no explanation. Does the business offend one particular maderator such that they see fit to delete it, but in many other forum topics there is no problem with mantioning business names.

 

If I post that I had no problems finding a Cache today with perfect accuracy down the street from the Love's truck stop where I was parked, is there any legitimate reason to delete the name of the truck stop? No there is not. This forum is a CONVERSATION...People mention those kinds of things in CONVERSATIONS. With no further explanation as to the reasons for deletion, I am only left to imagine that the deleted word is "Starbucks" and the moderator who deleted it had some grudge against that particular company.

Edited April 2, 2008 by WRITE SHOP ROBERT

[+XopherN71]

Easy there... it could have mentioned something that gave away the cache location, personal info, or any multitude of things - not necessarily a business.

 

Whatever the reason, they had one... good enough for me.

Edited April 2, 2008 by XopherN71

[+The Jester]

I doubt it was removed - there is no "edited by xx moderator" on that post...

[O-Mega]

This morning, during a search for a geocache (GCYH63) I found myself in the middle of a 4 lane highway. While I've experienced inaccuracy before, this was obviously no place for a cache. After checking for culverts, I gave up and went out to eat. When I got to CIA HQ by Black Helicopter, I noticed that my GPS was 893 feet off. I didn't think much of it until i got home and noticed that i was off by 902 feet.

I started to wonder what the possible cause of this could be. I called a friend of mine from college (he was in electrical engineering). He checked his GPS (same as mine) and confirmed an error of 865 feet. This scared him enough that he quickly made some calls to some of his buddies from the military. Now, he won't tell me exactly, but the US may be preparing an attack on a foreign country. He said it wasn't a world power, but he refused to elaborate further.

I don't know where to go with this so i'm asking you. My brother was recently deployed to a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I've emailed him, but haven' heard anything back yet. As he is really good with responding promptly, this has me worried.

Has anyone else experienced large errors with their GPS?

 

I used my Top Secret Decoder and recovered the missing text. I called my sources at Area 51 and they confirmed that the military is about to move on TPTB HQ and get them to return Virtuals, Moving Caches and let us post coin codes in our messages so we can collect all the icons our fingers will let us type in

[+Kealia]

I doubt it was removed - there is no "edited by xx moderator" on that post...

 

I was going to point that out as well.

[+hydnsek]

I doubt it was removed - there is no "edited by xx moderator" on that post...

 

I was going to point that out as well.

Me three. I kept waiting for someone to say "that was part of the joke..." Doh!

[+WRITE SHOP ROBERT]

I doubt it was removed - there is no "edited by xx moderator" on that post...

 

I was going to point that out as well.

Me three. I kept waiting for someone to say "that was part of the joke..." Doh!

I checked that against a post I had before that actually had a pic deleted by a mod, and there is no such note on the post, and that's my point. If a mod deletes something from a post, they should be required to state the reason, and the name of the mod who deleted .

Edited April 2, 2008 by WRITE SHOP ROBERT

[Dinoprophet]

Thing is, we get an "Is SA turned on?" thread several times a year. So it's a bit like posting "I hate micros......APRIL FOOLS! I actually like them! I can't believe you thought I hated micros!"

 

(Now are we going to have to hear about how the humorless mods let this joke thread live while they squashed another one?)

Edited April 2, 2008 by Dinoprophet

[teppupkcos]

Wow, thanks to everyone for playing along. No, Selective Availability has obviously not been turned on. Think of all the airplanes, travellers, convicted felons (ankle bracelets), and surveyors

Thanks to everyone that played along. Also, please refrain from tearing apart the mods. They didn't delete anything (as a few level headed people pointed out). Don't forget to look for the pale blue note on the bottom of the post for edits.

While the SA was supposed to be the main joke, I was impressed with the number of responses defending and criticizing the Mods.

Thanks for playing along

**Deleted by mod**

[+Confucius' Cat]

Think of all the airplanes, travellers, convicted felons (ankle bracelets), and surveyors

 

OH! THE HUMANITY!

[+Kealia]

...convicted felons (ankle bracelets), and surveyors

 

Whew! I was afraid to go outside all day yesterday for fear of the local police showing up thinking I had left my 30 foot zone. Now I go outside and play - yippie.

 

Great, now I've said too much.

**Deleted by moderator**

[+Renegade Knight]

I just created a waypoint in my driveway and downloaded it to ExpertGps. The map shows I'm on a rooftop several houses away?

That's normal. Your GPS can be spot on. But the maps themselves are not spot on.

[+Driver Carries Cache]

This morning, during a search for a geocache (GCYH63) I found myself in the middle of a 4 lane highway. While I've experienced inaccuracy before, this was obviously no place for a cache. After checking for culverts, I gave up and went out to eat. When I got to **removed by moderator**, I noticed that my GPS was 893 feet off. I didn't think much of it until i got home and noticed that i was off by 902 feet.

I started to wonder what the possible cause of this could be. I called a friend of mine from college (he was in electrical engineering). He checked his GPS (same as mine) and confirmed an error of 865 feet. This scared him enough that he quickly made some calls to some of his buddies from the military. Now, he won't tell me exactly, but the US may be preparing an attack on a foreign country. He said it wasn't a world power, but he refused to elaborate further.

I don't know where to go with this so i'm asking you. My brother was recently deployed to a carrier in the Indian Ocean. I've emailed him, but haven' heard anything back yet. As he is really good with responding promptly, this has me worried.

Has anyone else experienced large errors with their GPS?

We just went outside and tested our two Magellan SportTrak Pro GPS receivers and our Explorist 100, and all are showing errors on known waypoints of from 599 feet to 993 feet. So, I just tried calling a geocacher friend of ours who works for the federal government in a GIS capacity; he has a top-secret security clearance. He was very close-lipped, but confirmed that SA was activated today and that there is something afoot, but he said that he could not tell me more.

 

APRIL FOOLS!

 

I thought for sure that Vinny was about to tell us it had something to do with the Alien Grays!

 

DCC

[+root1657]

Wow, these forums are easy to troll. Not a one of the first 10 posters knows what today's date is?

 

Post 3 (and 5) called them out...

Even though I "got it" the second I saw the forum thread header, and before even opening the thread, I enjoyed this one immensely! It was a great concept!

 

Poster #9 was well aware of the date and explained it out anyway for education purposes. Gets old seeing so many people saying that SA would never be turned back on, or dont know it can be localized.

[+root1657]

I just created a waypoint in my driveway and downloaded it to ExpertGps. The map shows I'm on a rooftop several houses away?

That's normal. Your GPS can be spot on. But the maps themselves are not spot on.

 

As long as you mentioned that, might it be a useful new feature to one of the 'GPS games' if people could get map sections with reference markers on them, like an intersection or the corner of a notable building or something, and then those people could go to that spot and provide a GPS location. A few measurements by a few people on different days (weather) could be averaged together and then the map images could be 'bumped' a little to line them up right.

 

Anyone who wants to start doing something like that, fel free to 'steal' my idea. If anyone is already doing this, sorry for stealing your idea, and how do I 'play'?