Should Ground Teams Be Required To Have GPS?

[davidsinn]

My phone GPS works great in an airplane with all the radios turned off. Tell your expert to get a real phone.

If you turn all the radios off, which is what is required when flying, your GPS won't work at all.

Receivers have to be turned off just like transmitters.

It's called airplane mode for a reason. I have seen multiple CAP aircraft flying with hand held GPS for track logging. How can a receiver cause interference?

[SarDragon]

My phone GPS works great in an airplane with all the radios turned off. Tell your expert to get a real phone.

If you turn all the radios off, which is what is required when flying, your GPS won't work at all.

Receivers have to be turned off just like transmitters.

Huh? Could you elaborate on that a little bit, please? I'm not understanding where you're going with this.

[SarDragon]

My phone GPS works great in an airplane with all the radios turned off. Tell your expert to get a real phone.

If you turn all the radios off, which is what is required when flying, your GPS won't work at all.

Receivers have to be turned off just like transmitters.

It's called airplane mode for a reason. I have seen multiple CAP aircraft flying with hand held GPS for track logging. How can a receiver cause interference?

The cause of any interference comes from oscillators. Just because something doesn't have a transmitter doesn't mean that it doesn't have any oscillators. Most receivers have one or more local oscillators, and depending on the frequency, they might cause interference to other electronic devices.

On a side note, GPS units are receivers. There's no transmitter involved in the user devices. The do have local oscillators, so could potentially cause interference, but are of such low power output that they are allowed on airliners above 10,000 feet, when the plane is not in takeoff/climb/descend/landing mode.

[sdcapmx]

I am a firm believer that we should use all tools available to us.  If there are GPS units for GTs and the IC/GBD wants them used they should use them.  I also issue our GTs and aircrews a data logger so that I can download their tracks when they report back to mission base.  The data loggers are around $50 and our wing has at least 10 of them with many of our members owning their own.  This just makes a nice, quick way to show at a glance where exactly we have been.  Sure I still use wall charts and grids etc but the data tracks supplement that. 

Try turning the GPS screen off in a G1000 AC while on a search sometime.  Can the search still be done, yes but why not use all the tools given. 

That being said, we need to continue training without GPS etc. because it may not always be there when we need it..