The FAA Loran Program Status and Expectations

Richard P. Arnold

Abstract:	The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is entering the final stages of a program to bring LORAN into the National Airspace System (NAS) as a navigation aid for en route, terminal and nonprecision approach phases of flight. Over a dozen private-use LORAN approaches have been commissioned and considerable data have been accumulated on performance characteristics and reliability of the LORAN system. Recently, the first ten public-use LORAN approaches were published; but they cannot be utilized because at this time there are no receivers that have been fully qualified to Technical Standard Order C 60b for nonprecision approaches. Soon LORAN will be fully operational in the NAS and it will cause many changes in FAA controlled operations. For instance, LORAN is an earth-referenced navigation system versus the station-referenced navaids presently used in the NAS. LORAN facilitates point-to-point routing; but before this capability can be used, it must be reconciled with the current routing structure. Finally, LORAN will make possible thousands of new nonprecision approaches. Development of these procedures will necessitate extensive operational and organizational adjustments in the FAA. This paper will examine the anticipated impact of LORAN in the NAS, and proffer some solutions to difficulties that must be overcome in order to fully realize the potential of this new aviation navigation aid.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 1991 National Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation January 22 - 24, 1991 Sheraton San Marcos Hotel Phoenix, AZ
Pages:	55 - 57
Cite this article:	Arnold, Richard P., "The FAA Loran Program Status and Expectations," Proceedings of the 1991 National Technical Meeting of The Institute of Navigation, Phoenix, AZ, January 1991, pp. 55-57.
Full Paper:	ION Members/Non-Members: 1 Download Credit Sign In