Word: gps
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Find yourself on the southern edge of Africa with 48 hours to spare and a good set of wheels at your disposal? Then set the GPS coordinates for Franschhoek in the Western Cape, and from there take a spin down Africa's southernmost road - the Garden Route. Here's an itinerary for two days of indulgence...
...submarines. More than 10 satellites were eventually launched, though ground units had to wait up to several hours to pick up a signal. Meanwhile, engineers Ivan Getting and Bradford Parkinson began leading a Defense Department project to provide continuous navigation information, leading to the development of GPS (formally known as NAVSTAR GPS) in 1973. The military launched the first GPS satellite in 1978 and completed the system in 1995. GPS uses a "constellation" of 24 satellites orbiting 12,000 miles high, each circling the globe every 12 hours. The 2,000-lb satellites broadcast radio signals to Earth with information...
...GPS plays a major role in American military combat, guiding missiles and bombs to their destinations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. President Reagan opened the fledgling navigational system to nonmilitary uses in 1983 after Soviet fighter jets shot down Korean Air flight 007, a passenger jet that had accidentally strayed into Soviet airspace, killing all 269 on board...
Civilian demand for GPS products surged in 2000, when the military ended its practice of intentionally fuzzing the satellite's signals for security purposes. Overnight, navigation devices became 10 times more accurate and swiftly became standard equipment in a slew of industries, from commercial fishing to freight-hauling. Consumers have also rushed in as the size and price of GPS receivers have dropped; they're growing increasingly common in phones, wristwatches and even dog collars. Adventure seekers use GPS for a game called geocaching, a kind of satellite-based treasure hunt that currently boasts more than 800,000 active "caches...
...report does not predict that the GPS system will fail outright; it offers a more mild (and vague) warning, suggesting only that a delay in replacing satellites may impede "the level of GPS service that the U.S. government commits to." But given the world's growing dependence on the space-age compasses, the military scrambled to quell any concerns. "The issue is under control. We are working hard to get out the word," Air Force Col. Dave Buckman wrote to worried questioners on a military Twitter account May 20. "GPS isn't falling...