GLONASS H4Xx0rD

[piscator]

Reported Issue:

SmartNet North America, as well as other GNSS Network Service providers, have identified a GLONASS ephemeral issue that is affecting GNSS tracking characteristics of GNSS receivers on a global basis. We have confirmed our findings with our sister network, SmartNet Australia, as well as 2 other service providers and have reported the issue back to the Russian Federal Space Agency.

The issue, while primarily affecting GLONASS tracking, has also caused some makes and models of GNSS receivers to completely stop tracking both GPS and GLONASS rendering services in the immediate area offline. There are also certain firmware versions of certain GNSS receiver types that seem to be more sensitive to the issue as well.

Update #1 - 9:22 PM ET

The "illegal ephemeris" has been reported and is being displayed on the Russian Federal Space Agency website - http://snna.co/1dPuHSD

Issue Resolution:

The "illegal ephemeris" that is being broadcast by the GLONASS constellation must be corrected and uploaded into each satellite to correct the issue by the Russian Federal Space Agency system. This cannot happen until the satellites pass back over the Agency's upload station so the upload link can take place. Each satellite passes the upload station on 12 hour orbits, so at the moment the only resolution to the issue is to wait until a healthy ephemeris can propagate completely thru the constellation.

Update - 9:25 AM ET, April 2, 2014

The health ephemeris has propagated thru the GLONASS constellation and operations seem to be have returned to normal.

Timeline:

6:00 PM ET, April 1, 2014 - GLONASS Tracking issues were noticed by SmartNet AUS and SmartNet NA

7:00 PM ET, April 1, 2014 - Issue began spreading to additional receivers (West to East) in NA

[piscator]

For those who aren't familiar with GLONASS, it's a Russian global navigation satellite system (GNSS), like GPS, Galileo, or Beidou. Yesterday it went titsup and within an hour all 24 GLONASS satellites needed an unexpected firmware reflash because they were broadcasting grossly erroneous positions. Given that downtime is a bad thing for a GNSS system, and not all SVs dropped simultaneously as would be the case with most programming bugs, one has to wonder how GLONASS came down?

[FBM]

And why. I'm thinking Ian...