Comparing Loran-C and GPS Navigation Systems

Electronic navigation systems are presently a very significant component of marine, land and aeronautic navigation as a result of their important role in ensuring safe navigation. Navigation is according to Oxford Dictionaries (n.d.) “The process or activity of accurately ascertaining one’s position and planning and following a route”. They help navigators to locate their positions in land, sea and air. In marine navigation, there are many types of navigation systems were used by mariners. Some of them are land- based navigation systems such as Loran- C, Decca and Omega. Others are satellite- based navigation systems like GLONASS, GALILEO, and GPS (Anwar, 2006). This essay shall compare between Loran- C and GPS navigation systems to prove that GPS navigation system is better than Loran-C navigation system. The comparison will be between the two systems accuracies, errors effects, coverages, dependence and independence of weather conditions and finally their ability to restore data but before that a brief idea about how these systems work and their importance will be provided.
The Loran-c is a radionavigation system (called also a hyperbolic navigation system). It was developed from a previous hyperbolic navigation system called Loran A. Loran stands for Long Range Navigation. However, Loran-C has lower frequency pluses than Loran A which made it more accurate (Bowditch, 2002). Loran-C task is determining ships and airplanes positions using low-frequency pulses transmitted from land-based transmitters. The pulses are then received by receivers on ships and airplanes helping to determine their positions in either time difference or longitude/latitude (Tetley et al, 2001). The hyperbolic system (Loran-C) utilise two lines of position...

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