Trimble is supporting Project Pressure by providing advanced GNSS positioning technology and research funding for the nonprofit organization’s latest expedition to map the disappearing tropical glaciers of Puncak Jaya in Papua, Indonesia.

Project Pressure has released a centimeter-accurate, 3D model of the receding ice, created using Trimble positioning technology and drone-based photogrammetry. The model establishes a scientific baseline for calculating the rate of glacier recession and projecting the timeline of disappearance.

Puncak Jaya, the highest peak in Oceania and one of the Seven Summits, is expected to be the first of the seven continental peaks to lose its glaciers as global temperatures rise.

Local communities use the data to make informed choices about crop selection and prepare for expected water shortages caused by the loss of vital reservoirs.

This expedition marks the third successful outing in Project Pressure’s “Melting Topics” series, which focuses on mapping equatorial glaciers. Trimble provides its GNSS mapping technology and research funding from the Trimble Foundation Fund to support Project Pressure in gathering critical data in some of the world’s most remote and hostile environments.

“Mapping these glaciers before they disappear is of critical importance to establish a baseline to track the glacial regression and for the local communities to understand what is happening with their water source, allowing them to adapt to a changing climate,” said Eliot Jones, senior manager, strategy and partner development at Trimble. “Through a combination of precision technology, detailed project planning and rigorous science, the models created by Project Pressure are shared for scientific study and provide a visual reference for future generations.”

Precision under pressure in hostile terrain

Mapping glaciers at altitudes exceeding 4,800 meters (15,000 feet) presents extreme logistical and environmental challenges. Near-constant cloud cover and heavy rainfall in Papua often render satellite imagery unusable, making ground-based georeferencing essential.

The expedition team installed precise geolocation reference points directly on the glacial surface at multiple locations. Using the Trimble Catalyst DA2 GNSS system and Trimble TDC600 handheld, researchers captured the exact coordinates of those points with centimeter-level accuracy. Drone imagery was then processed against the Trimble coordinates to produce a scientifically reliable 3D model of the glacier.

“Trimble makes incredibly complex technology feel simple in the field,” said Klaus Thymann, scientist and lead explorer. “When you’re standing on a glacier in freezing conditions, wearing thick gloves and surrounded by clouds, you don’t have time to fight with equipment. With Trimble, I can capture centimeter-accurate readings and the interface is so intuitive that even someone with no prior training can help collect data. That kind of reliability and simplicity is critical when you’re working in some of the most remote and challenging environments in the world.”

This approach builds on methods developed during Project Pressure’s 2024 expedition to the Rwenzori Mountains in Uganda, which also used Trimble technology.

The lightweight Trimble Catalyst DA2 GNSS system was critical for the expedition, which required helicopter access to Basecamp, followed by a trek to the launch point.

<p>The post Trimble tech enables cm-accurate 3D model of disappearing glaciers first appeared on GPS World.</p>

Both modules feature pin-to-pin compatibility, enabling platform flexibility and simplifying product development across vehicle generations as well as jamming and spoofing detection to mitigate the impact of security risks.

The ZED-X20K is designed for mass-market ADAS L3 and TCU/IVI applications, delivering lane-level accuracy worldwide using all-band GNSS and native Galileo High Accuracy Service (HAS). By eliminating the need for paid correction services, backend infrastructure, or service management, it reduces total cost and accelerates time-to-market while maintaining consistent global performance. 

For applications that require a functional-safety concept for GNSS sensors, the ZED-A20K introduces a new architectural approach. It provides ISO 26262 ASIL-B(D)-compliant GNSS RAW data simultaneously to high-performance QM positioning outputs within a single module. This enables OEMs to transition from traditional dual hardware based-GNSS systems to a single module approach, reducing system complexity and cost. 

With flexible support of externally hosted positioning engines, especially for ADAS of Levels 3 and up, the A20 concept enables enhanced flexibility for SDV–based architectures. The form-factor compatibility between ZED-X20K and ZED-A20K allows the flexibility to equip different trim levels with or without functional safety requirements out of a single socket.

The ZED-X20K has reached the engineering sample stage, and its evaluation kit is available. Samples for the ZED-A20K will be available starting in August.

<p>The post U-blox expands auto GNSS portfolio, enabling ADAS & increasing safety first appeared on GPS World.</p>

UAV Navigation — a division of Grupo Oesía specializing in advanced guidance, navigation and control solutions for unmanned vehicles — has launched the Vector-300high‑performance autopilot.

Vector-300 is designed to meet the industrial and operational requirements of mass‑produced, attritable unmanned aerial systems, with a clear focus on loitering munition and Counter-UAS (C-UAS) interceptor applications.

Vector‑300 has been engineered to combine advanced autonomous guidance, navigation and control (GNC) capabilities with scalability and manufacturability. Its architecture is designed to reduce technical complexity and enable agile, large‑scale production while ensuring consistent and reliable performance across high‑volume deployments.

Designed for high‑dynamic interception and terminal missions, Vector‑300 delivers strike‑to‑target precision guidance with bull’s eye accuracy. The autopilot supports the integration of AI‑based target identification and optical data directly into its autonomous GNC loops, enabling advanced engagement of both static and dynamic targets. This architecture supports real‑time trajectory adaptation during pursuit and terminal engagement phases, making Vector‑300 suitable for demanding loitering munition and C-UAS interceptor operations.

Vector‑300 is designed to operate in highly contested and GNSS‑denied environments, even under electronic warfare (EW) jamming, spoofing and meaconing. Its robust navigation core relies on advanced inertial algorithms and multisensor fusion to ensure mission continuity across all phases of operation and can be easily complemented with UAV Navigation–Grupo Oesía proprietary solutions such as the Visual Navigation System to enhance dead‑reckoning accuracy.

Building on the battlefield-proven capabilities of the Vectorautopilot family, Vector‑300 enables the full range of advanced operations already established across UAV Navigation–Grupo Oesía solutions. These include

• fully autonomous mission execution
• swarming and formation flight
• 4D trajectory management to reach targets at a predefined time
• high‑dynamic maneuvers
• manned‑unmanned teaming (MUT) operations
• many other advanced autonomous capabilities.

Its open and modular architecture is designed to ensure interoperability with third‑party platforms, payloads and sensors through seamless integration with Vector‑MCC. This architecture also enables the integration of autonomous decision‑making software, allowing platforms equipped with Vector‑300 to adapt to evolving concepts of operation and advanced autonomy requirements.

<p>The post Vector-300 autopilot designed for mass production of C-UAS interceptors first appeared on GPS World.</p>

Challenge: Capturing a massive heritage site, including every detail from courtyards and buildings down to a drawbridge and individual rivets on castle gates. 

Solution: Artec Jet, Artec Ray II, Artec Leo, Artec Twins 

Why Artec 3D? The highly maneuverable Artec Jet can be attached to a backpack and simply walked through an environment. Entire scenes can be captured from ground level in minutes, including tall structures from a range of up to 300 meters. Artec Ray II and Leo deliver higher accuracy for applications like long-term monitoring, damage assessment, and restoration. 

Odawara Castle: A gateway into Japan’s past

Odawara Castle was built more than 500 years ago, with fortifications first erected during the Kamakura period — a time famous for the emergence of the Samurai and Japan’s first Shogun. 

The site’s illustrious walls are steeped in history. Situated on a hill and surrounded by a moat, the castle has strong fortifications, so it was coveted and fought over for generations. Three sieges of Odawara took place from 1561-90 and the structure changed hands (and shape) multiple times over the next century as different leaders left their stamp on the property. 

At times, the legacy of Odawara Castle has been difficult to protect. The entire site was shaken to its foundations by multiple earthquakes from 1703-1853 and the Meiji government of the late 19th century ordered that all feudal structures be destroyed, so it was mostly torn down. 

In 1938, what remained of Odawara Castle was made a heritage site and slowly rebuilt. But over the years, it has remained a delicate piece of history in need of ongoing renovation. With this in mind, the Artec 3D support team — in Japan for a recent trade mission — opted to digitize the entire structure for future generations to enjoy using Artec Jet, Artec Ray II and Artec Leo. 

Capturing an entire castle in minutes 

When they arrived at the castle, engineers immediately understood the scale of the challenge  they were embarking on. Once one of medieval Japan’s largest fortifications, the site’s outer defensive perimeter is a whopping nine kilometers long. Odawara Castle is also a national landmark that’s open to visitors, so they didn’t have the facility all to themselves either.

This meant that speed and subtlety were critical. It would’ve been entirely possible to capture the site with a lidar, tripod-mounted Ray II, by positioning it around different areas of the fort. But this would take a prohibitive amount of time — especially when you consider that double scans are required to remove moving objects. Using Artec Jet was a lot more straightforward. 

Attaching the device to a backpack meant the castle could be scanned on foot. Walking the site, almost as if they were a tourist, was enough to capture the entire scene. Artec Jet’s remote app gave real-time feedback on scan progress, so the team didn’t leave any detail uncaptured — and compared to capture with shorter-range scanners, the time savings were enormous. 

“Artec Jet scans in a linear fashion. If it takes you two minutes to walk, it’ll take two minutes to scan — the complexity of the scene has little bearing,” explains Artec 3D scanning expert Keynan Tenenboim. “In the same time it took for Leo to scan 2-3 walls, Ray II scanned a building, and Jet digitized an entire castle. Adding in Ray II & Leo was great for areas with accessibility issues — and capturing higher detail around the walls, gate, and courtyard.” 

A Trio of Scanners for the Task

Natural environments like trees, rivers, and larger connecting spaces often offer valuable site context, but don’t need to be captured with high accuracy. Artec Jet was perfect for picking up this sort of background information, generating a continuous point cloud, and connecting the site’s more interesting features: historic walls, ornate roofs, and courtyards around the castle. 

Jet’s 300-meter range meant there was no need for ladders or scaffolding. The inner structure was captured from ground level without other visitors even noticing. Unlike Ray II, which scans from static viewpoints, Jet could also be maneuvered into difficult-to-reach areas. Both scanners are less accurate than Leo — but that’s why it’s best to combine datasets, for peak results. 

In this case, Ray II was deployed to scan the inner courtyard and gate, with Leo being used to pick up smaller details like the confined area behind the entrance. Handheld 3D scanning was also perfect for capturing a nearby medieval wall. As you can see from the scan below, fine details like tile patterns, lettering, and the wall’s internals were all captured in a single sweep. 

“This was the perfect project for demonstrating the benefits of all three scanners,” said Tenenboim. “The main castle wouldn’t be a good fit for Leo and it didn’t really fit Ray II. There was no good vantage point where we could see the facade from 100 meters away. Thanks to Jet’s range, we were able to scan from a ground level. Okay, we could’ve improved roof capture by flying Jet on a drone — but this would require more site preparation.” 

Heritage preservation with end-use potential 

Once engineers had finished scanning, they sent data back to Artec’s Luxembourg HQ via cloud sharing for processing in Artec Twins. Specifically designed to handle large datasets, Artec Twins software allows Artec Jet, Ray & Leo scans to be merged — either into a unified point cloud, or a 3D mesh that can be measured and exported to industry platforms like Autodesk Revit. 

In terms of applications, the resulting 3D point cloud would be perfect for building a virtual museum tour that allows visitors to virtually explore Odawara Castle. Regular data capture sessions would also allow site operators to monitor conditions over time. If a building’s traditional rooftop began to sag, for example, it’d be possible to carry out rapid repairs.

Deployable in seven modes: by-hand, backpack, pole, cage, robot, vehicle, or drone, Artec Jet adapts to any environment, allowing users to replace complicated multi-tool workflows. Clearly, Artec’s Odawara Castle scan is just the beginning, there are many more sites left to explore. 

See the captured dataset from this project here. 

<p>The post 3D scanning experts digitize Japan’s historic Odawara Castle first appeared on GPS World.</p>

The latest rollout adds more than 2,200 U.S. lakes and extends coverage into Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia in Europe, opening more waterways for boaters across the globe to explore. This comes not long after Danish charts from hydrographic offices were also added to the navigation app.

Prioritized by where boaters are most active, the latest update includes all major Minnesota lakes and expands lake coverage in 20 other U.S. states.

“Land mapping across much of the developed world, has benefited from sustained investment over several decades. Hydrographic data, the mapping of water, has a different history,” explained Elena Petru, geospatial data engineer at Savvy Navvy. “Survey cycles are longer, coverage is uneven, and for inland waters like lakes and reservoirs the situation is patchier still.

“Multiple authorities may hold overlapping or conflicting data for the same body of water, formats vary, and there is no single canonical source that can simply be downloaded and trusted. This fragmentation is exactly the challenge our geospatial team is solving through a structured reconciliation process.”

Petru joined Savvy Navvy in 2023, bringing her geomatics background from land data roles into the specific challenges of marine and inland water charting. Her expertise has enabled development of new data pipelines to overcome these marine charting challenges — marking a significant step in Savvy Navvy’s ongoing chart development program being based on unique, comprehensive data.

“You’d be surprised how often official sources do not fully line up. One of the main challenges is that the same lake can be represented slightly differently depending on the dataset. The task was not to pick one and apply it, but to compare sources carefully, understand where they differed, and make informed decisions about how each lake should be represented,” Petru said. “By going beyond official sources with our own expert validation process, we can integrate new regions faster while maintaining high data integrity, which overcomes one of the biggest difficulties in marine navigation. It’s exciting to see this data go live in the Savvy Navvy app knowing boaters can now use it on the water every day.

This approach forms part of Savvy Navvy’s broader data processing pipeline, enabling consistent, repeatable expansion into new regions. Through these data pipelines we can now deliver faster, more expansive chart coverage including waters not yet fully covered by official hydrographic surveys. 

Savvy Navvy has been downloaded more than three million times globally. Unlike other boating navigation solutions, Savvy Navvy provides smart routing, giving users optimal routes and dynamic ETAs based on real-time data: departure time, chart information, weather conditions, tide, boat specifications and local regulations. The updated chart coverage is available across both the Savvy Navvy app and its integrated solutions.

Last month Savvy Navvy launched its new waves feature, turning complex wave data into a simple visual view that helps boaters understand how conditions will actually feel on the water.
Worldwide chart coverage is available on all Savvy Navvy plans.

<p>The post Savvy Navvy scales coverage through advanced geospatial data processing first appeared on GPS World.</p>

Without hesitation, the family awakened from their sleep, grabbed wallets, smartphones, car keys and hurriedly descended the stairs into the shelter. Doors sealed, the children crawled into their shelter beds.

The mother and father, listening to the weather radio, heard their county’s name in the emergency broadcast. They looked at the smartphone’s weather map blinking with the text alert. A large swath of rain covered the area, painting yellows and reds inside a field of green. At the trailing edge of the storm, where skies were beginning to clear, the storm’s red tail began curling into a ball, moving directly toward them. Inside the ball, a dark red deepened into a growing magenta core. White pixels appeared within the magenta tail. Its path was unchanged and it was closing.

The man and woman huddled together watching the storm radar app on his mobile device not thinking about how their situational awareness is a confluence of spatial wizardry and atmospheric thermodynamics. The WSR-88D NEXRAD (Level III) radar scans a 143-mile radius, sweeping 14 elevation angles every five minutes to create a composite view of the surrounding weather. Colors correspond to the intensity of reflected hydrometeors (forms of precipitation) ranging from 0 dBZ, light rain in blue and green, to 75 dBZ, hail in magenta, and at 95 dBZ, it is physical debris carried aloft showing as white. Assembling the radars from across the country creates a seamless national weather mosaic (weather.gov/Radar). The dot on the smartphone’s weather app marking their own position is GNSS, orbiting far above.

In his hand both the NEXRAD and GNSS are blended in real-time as he watches the Tornado Vortex Signature (TVS) move toward his family and his house. Beyond the closed shelter doors, tornado sirens wail, mixed with peals of thunder. The warnings are no longer county names but names of towns. There are people for whom such a moment is not hypothetical. Scott Bagenzie knows exactly what comes next, not from imagination but from experience.

On Monday, May 20, 2013, at 2:56 p.m. Central Time, an EF5 tornado touched down northwest of Newcastle, Oklahoma, rapidly intensifying as it carved a path to Moore. The tornado lasted 36 minutes and covered 17 miles (FIGURE 1). Scott was caught by it, and I had the privilege of hearing him tell me what it is actually like to be inside those moments of sheer terror the rest of us only read about. He left work at 2:15 p.m. despite National Weather Service warnings for the counties flanking Oklahoma City. As he closed his car door, the sirens at the Mike Monroney Aeronautical Center went off. Security tried stopping him. He drove anyway.

“I was dodging cars left and right as people were taking pictures out to the southwest. I called Mari and said, hey, I’m running to the house to make sure the pets are taken care of. And she said, You crazy ***, take care of yourself.”

He pulled into his driveway, secured two cats in the closet and the dogs in the front bathroom, then stepped outside to see where the tornado was. His neighbor, who had an underground shelter in his garage, called out from next door: Get in over here! Scott went. As soon as the latch clicked behind them, debris began hitting the house above.

Weather as GIS

Weather is the most common topic of greetings. It is often the front page on newspapers. Television news is incomplete without a weather report, and weather is among the most downloaded apps on smartphones.

In many ways, the first GIS was weather, starting in the mid-1800s, long before computers, GNSS and GPS, hand-plotting data points, and then hand-drawing lines of equal pressure, temperature, humidity and winds on charts.

In the 1990s as a U.S. Navy weather specialist, I drew these charts by hand, plus four upper air charts learning how 3D spatial volumes interact. That was manual GIS. Now, in 2026, weather continues leading geospatial innovation via phased array radars, dual-pole radars (horizontal and vertical scans), acoustic atmospheric sensors, and predictive modeling for weather and climate, all of them layering atmospheric data using complex algorithms to forecast a dynamic fluid medium moving over an irregular spinning sphere that is unevenly heated. It is remarkably accurate, pushing the edges of geospatial predictive modeling.

The architecture of violence

The primary driver of powerful tornadoes is atmospheric thermodynamics unique to North America. Dry air crossing over the Rockies, cold arctic air pulled south by the jet stream, and warm moist air drawn north from the Gulf of America converge in a cauldron that can boil a normal convective storm into a sustained mesoscale supercell producing EF-5 tornadoes, the most powerful on record. Even though they make up less than one percent of all tornadoes, it is rare for EF5 tornados to occur anywhere else on Earth.

The Enhanced Fujita (EF) scale for measuring them was developed in 1971 by Theodore Fujita, a Japanese engineer whose forensic study of atomic bomb blast damage at Nagasaki and Hiroshima led to his damage-based framework for measuring tornado intensity.

The jet stream, a river of air riding a thermal pressure gradient in the upper atmosphere, creates vorticity as cold dense arctic air plummets south, wedging beneath the warmer Gulf air and forcing it upward along the frontal boundary, before the jet stream curves back north. FIGURE 2, the 300 mb (mb stands for millibars of pressure) chart, shows this process has caused a low pressure over Texas sitting in a 1,200-foot-deep ravine. A jet streak will form as air rushes into the ravine increasing the jet stream’s speed, which draws in rising convection currents that can spawn mesoscale storm cells and set up the potential genesis of severe tornadoes.

When a funnel cloud forms, it is the visible physics of pressure dropping the temperature to the dew point causing condensation. The dropping pressure forms a bowl shape. Air flows into the dropping pressure, and the base of the cloud rotates cyclonically. As the rotation increases, centrifugal force of the colder dense rotating air pushes out the warmer higher-pressure air, further lowering the pressure at the core and deepening the bowl. That continues as the base descends into higher pressures at the surface, tightening the bowl into a cone. The difference in pressure between air outside the cone and what’s inside the vortex core can be 100 mb. That is basically a hole and wind rushes in to fill that void, but centrifugal force acts against the air. A tornado is born.

Wraiths of destruction

On May 31, 2013, 11 days after Moore, a multiple-vortex tornado formed near El Reno, Oklahoma. Along its periphery, small vortices spun around the rotating edge, circling, combining, breaking apart, vanishing and reforming, like wraiths of destruction dancing in a ring. The column darkened, descended and enveloped its own micro-vortices, forming the largest tornado ever recorded: 2.6 miles wide at its base.

It grew so rapidly that experienced TWISTEX storm chasers attempting to place instrument disks behind it were consumed as it expanded from 1.6 miles to 2.6 miles wide. A father, his son, and a colleague were killed; their car was found eight miles away.

Storm chasers are not thrill-seekers. WSR-88D NEXRAD, even at its lowest scan angle, already sits at 14,000 ft at its range limit because of the Earth’s curvature; spotters provide the ground truth radar cannot. Instruments such as Ground-based Local Infrasound Data Acquisition (GLINDA) extend that capability further: Tornadoes produce infrasound as low as 0.5 Hz, with a correlation between tornado size and frequency that may one day provide an early warning radar cannot.

I asked Scott whether he felt the tornado before he heard it.

“I couldn’t feel it,” he said, “but I could hear the sound of the train coming.”

I pressed him to describe it beyond the cliché. He thought for a moment, then said, “It’s not a cliché. That is what it sounds like. It sounds like a freight train, and the sound of the house being torn apart.”

The roar grows

Back in the shelter, the physics unfolded exactly as Scott described. Unaware of the sensation, a deep groaning sound resonates miles ahead of the tornado. A low constant roar grows louder as it approaches. Explosions pop as transformers blow. The shelter is pitch black except for the phone screen, that small glowing window showing a white ball of catastrophe moving toward them. The roar grows louder. Ears pop. Temperature drops. The house shakes. The roar of the freight train is so loud the screams inside the shelter cannot be heard. The doors rattle. The whirlwind is trying to break in. Then the roar fades, almost to silence, an eerie quiet.

In Scott’s shelter, the sequence was identical. His ears popped suddenly and painfully; they hurt for a full day afterward. In an EF5 tornado, pressure drops from roughly 950 mb in the surrounding air to 850 mb at the vortex core. The 100 mb passing over him was equal to a 3,000-ft pressure drop. It is the equivalent of instantly ascending two Empire State buildings stacked on top of each other, like falling straight up into the sky. Fighting against that force, Scott and his neighbor held shut the shelter latch as the doors bounced on their hinges.

“I don’t know how well those are constructed. I didn’t take any chances.”

Nearby, employees sheltering in a bank vault were physically holding the vault door closed as the tornado passed a thousand feet away. The vault’s timed lock could not engage. Five or six people leaned against a door designed to stop a robbery, fighting powerful thermodynamic forces.

Then Scott no longer had to hold the latch. The truck on the other side of the garage wall had been pushed against the hatch from outside, pinning them in. When they finally forced it open and stepped out. There was nothing.

“She just started screaming. She said, ‘No way, it didn’t do that.’ I told her, yeah, there’s nothing left.”

The entire event, from first debris strike to silence, lasted roughly one minute. At 28 miles per hour, a tornado traverses one mile in two minutes, plowing through a neighborhood in seconds.

Mapping the aftermath

The question the rest of us ask from a safer distance is: What is the true pattern of destruction across time and geography? To answer it, I built a Tornado Severity Index (TSI) using National Weather Service tornado data. On average, there are 970 tornadoes per year, 81% are EF0 and EF1; 18% are EF2 and EF3; and the catastrophic EF4 and EF5 make up 1%.

The NWS database reports the start and end coordinates, path width, magnitude, fatalities, injuries, and damages to property and crops. Working with the coordinate pairs, I calculated the distance and radial bearing of each path. But the EF scale alone tells only part of the story: A powerful tornado crossing an empty field and a moderate tornado crossing a dense neighborhood are not equivalent human events.

I did not want the TSI to be another version of the EF scale, so the weighting was based entirely on the human toll. The formula is total fatalities (F) at 100% plus injuries (I) at 10%, =F + (I x 0.1) and normalized on a scale of 1 to 100. Economic damage was originally part of the equation, but the data are inconsistent and unreliable across reporting jurisdictions.

The resulting composite doesn’t measure the strength of tornadoes, but rather their human impact (see FIGURE 3). The dataset of tornadoes from 1950 to 2024 is 71,813. Filtering it down to those tornadoes that had a human consequence where the TSI>1 reduced it to 2,362 tornadoes. I reduced it further to 1,625 including only those with one or more fatalities. This was made into a heatmap. The data were further reduced to 301, only filtering out all except where TSI>10. The heatmap color scale was weighted to the TSI Score. It shows where the highest concentration of intense tornadoes occurs.

The results confirm Tornado Alley from Texas up through Oklahoma, and it also reveals Dixie Alley, an even more destructive corridor of severe tornadoes over Mississippi, Alabama and Tennessee. These areas align with the deep spring meridional jet stream discussed earlier. The northern side of the jet stream enhances cyclonic flow for storms in the area. The peak region of vorticity is where the jet stream turns back north again over Dixie Alley. Additionally, the rising terrain in that area causes orographic lifting and more rain, many times hiding the tornadoes within the pouring rain.

GIS reveals what the physics predict: a narrow corridor of atmospheric geometry where conditions for catastrophic tornadoes are optimized, running through the same communities, year after year.

For the sake of context, the Joplin, Missouri tornado on May 22, 2011, that caused 158 fatalities, 1,150 injuries, and damages of $2.8 billion ranks at the top of the TSI. The Moore tornado only scored 16.6 due to far fewer fatalities.

The dataset reveals the physical signatures of severe tornadoes. On average, they peak in mid-May at 5:30 p.m. with a strength of EF4.2, carve a path 36 miles long and 2,073 feet wide, and each one causes 13 fatalities, 173 injuries, and losses of $71.5 million. Severe tornadoes do not travel west. They do travel a spectrum where most of them fall within a range from 016° to 060° with an average path of travel northeast at 031°. This is why Scott was right to question the reports of the El Reno tornado tracking southeast: What appeared to be southward motion was lateral growth. The tornado was not moving south; it was becoming enormous.

“Pretty much sucking everything up,” Scott said, with confidence born out of his experience.

The pattern and the person

The TSI heatmap is a record of moments like Scott’s, representing a convergence of humans caught up in brutal atmospheric physics, where air becomes violent. The science explains the experience. It cannot prevent the next EF5; the thermodynamics will prevail.

What GIS adds is pattern, memory and prediction. The TSI with directional analysis gives emergency managers, planners and underwriters insights for understanding where storm physics and humans intersect most acutely, and therefore where shelter codes and warning systems must be most robust.

The family in their shelter, watching the white dot approach on the glowing screen, is experiencing the culmination of decades of geospatial and meteorological investment: NEXRAD networks, GNSS constellations, real-time data fusion in a consumer app. But as Scott will tell you, the most important instrument was the steel latch on the shelter door, and what mattered most was the neighbor who held it open for him as the tornado approached.

Tornadoes are Earth’s thermodynamic engines of absolute chaos.

“I’m not interested in tornadoes,” Scott told me. “Once burnt, you don’t play with the matches anymore.”

Scott moved out of Oklahoma in 2013. The science is fascinating. People press right up to the edge of it, but the experience when science becomes personal is sheer terror.

Live tracking tornadoes with GIS census tracts can know in real-time the impact on populations to immediately begin rescue operations, clean-up and recovery.

GIS cannot capture the whirlwind, but it can track the most violent of them: northeast at 031°, seven football fields wide for 36 miles.

<p>The post Tracking the Whirlwind: Mapping tornadoes using GIS first appeared on GPS World.</p>

The market size for mid- and high-level precision GPS receivers is expected to reach $6.85 billion by 2030, expanding at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.2%. This robust growth over the forecast period is fueled by advancements in autonomous vehicle systems, expanding smart infrastructure projects, the rise of precision agriculture, increased use of highly accurate mapping solutions, and wider adoption of sophisticated GNSS correction services.

Important trends shaping the market include the pursuit of centimeter-level positioning accuracy, the integration of RTK and PPK technologies, use of multi-frequency signal processing, compatibility with survey software, and enhanced GNSS mapping precision.

A free sample of the report is available.

The market features numerous influential companies, including Stonex Group Inc., Raytheon Technologies Corporation, Hexagon AB, Trimble Inc., Topcon Positioning Systems Inc., u-blox AG, Hi-Target Surveying Instrument Co. Ltd., CHC Navigation Technology Ltd., Carlson Systems Holdings Inc., Septentrio N.V., Hemisphere GNSS Inc., Javad GNSS Inc., Swift Navigation Inc., Thales Group, Geneq Inc., South Surveying & Mapping Technology Co. Ltd., Tersus GNSS Inc., Eos Positioning Systems Inc., NavtechGPS Inc., Satlab Geosolutions AB, Tallysman Wireless Inc., Leica Geosystems AG, NovAtel Inc., Spectra Precision, Unistrong Science & Technology Co. Ltd., and ComNav Technology Ltd.

Notably, in March 2023, Netherlands-based CNH Industrial N.V., a provider of agricultural and construction equipment as well as precision automation solutions, acquired Hemisphere GNSS for $175 million. This strategic move aims to combine Hemisphere’s high-precision GNSS receivers and satellite-based correction technologies with CNH’s capabilities to enhance machine control, autonomy, and positioning in both construction and agricultural sectors. Hemisphere GNSS, headquartered in the U.S., supplies advanced GNSS receivers, antennas, and correction services tailored for surveying, machine control, agriculture, and marine uses.

Top companies in this sector are actively launching new products to maintain competitive advantage.

For example, in October 2025, Unicore Communications Inc., a China-based GNSS technology provider, introduced the UM98XC Series-a next-generation, all-constellation, multi-frequency RTK GNSS module. Supporting GPS, BDS, Galileo, GLONASS, and QZSS systems along with L-Band and CLAS correction services, the UM98XC offers centimeter-level positioning accuracy. It also features advanced anti-jamming capabilities, energy-efficient design, and consistent performance in challenging environments, making it well-suited for autonomous driving, precision agriculture, unmanned aerial vehicles, and smart transportation sectors.

This launch underscores Unicore’s commitment to pushing the boundaries of GNSS precision, reliability, and scalability for industrial and automotive applications.

<p>The post Market reports examine mid- and high-precision GNSS receiver market first appeared on GPS World.</p>

AIM+ Premium technology protects the receiver from sophisticated intentional or unintentional GNSS jamming or malicious spoofing attacks.

“By extending the mosaic family with mosaic-G5 P6, we are bringing an all-in-one module offering accuracy, resilience, and flexibility for demanding industrial applications,” said Yasmine Hunter, product manager at Septentrio. 

The newly released module offers one of the highest update rates on the market, combined with low latency, essential for efficient and accurate control systems and navigation. In addition to high-accuracy positioning, raw measurements are also available for high-performance sensor fusion. 

The mosaic-G5 P6 also offers users the flexibility to balance accuracy and availability and is compatible with Galileo High Accuracy Service (HAS) for decimeter-level positioning out of the box. Users can choose single- or dual-antenna configuration for accurate GNSS heading enabling robust orientation and motion control in industrial automation applications such as autonomous machinery, robotics and precision guidance systems.  
 
The new module is compatible with widely used, open-source autopilots like PX4 and ArduPilot as well as ROS, simplifying integration into robotic and drone systems. Its evaluation kitsimplifies testing with direct autopilot connections, while the free RxTools user interface assists with the setup and evaluation process.

Meet our GNSS experts and see mosaic-G5 P6 during Xponential in Detroit, Michigan, May 11–14, at booth #37030. For more information about mosaic-G5 P6 or other Septentrio products, contact the Septentrio team.

<p>The post Septentrio extends GNSS module family with mosaic-G5 P6 first appeared on GPS World.</p>

According to the development team, the goal of the USX51 platform is not only to provide hardware, but to simplify complex UAV system integration for developers, research teams, and robotics engineers working on real world deployment scenarios.

The USX51 system integrates Pixhawk 6X and RDK X5 to support PX4-based UAV development for GNSS-denied, VTOL, and multi-sensor applications.

The system is designed to support PX4-based UAV development while separating real-time flight control tasks from high compute perception workloads. This decoupled architecture helps maintain flight stability while allowing developers to expand into vision based and autonomous applications.

The USX51 supports development scenarios including:

• GNSS-denied navigation
• VTOL mission platforms
• Multi-sensor integration
• Visual perception and tracking
• ROS2-based robotics workflows
• Research and autonomous UAV development

The Pixhawk 6X handles flight critical control functions, while the RDK X5 module provides onboard computing capability for visual processing, sensor fusion, and autonomous related workloads.

The system also provides multiple communication interfaces including Ethernet, CAN, UART and I2C, allowing developers to integrate cameras, thermal modules, lidar systems, and additional peripherals into their UAV projects.

Current ecosystem development around USX51 includes PX4 integration, ROS2 workflows, developer testing programs, and community based project collaboration.

<p>The post USX51 flight controller aids UAV development first appeared on GPS World.</p>

The achieved results match simulation models within a decibel, making this approach a fast and reliable way to verify antenna performance.

For manufacturers of SATCOM systems facing large chamber constraints, it offers a clear path to quicker, more cost-effective testing. 

Electronically steerable array (ESA) antennas are becoming key components in modern SATCOM systems. Accurate knowledge of their radiation pattern is required for reliable operation in LEO, MEO and GEO orbits. However, conventional far‑field testing demands chambers that are often larger than practical for Ku or Ka band antennas, especially when the aperture of the Antenna Under Test (AUT) reaches half a meter or more.

Compact Antenna Test Ranges (CATR), on the other hand, are still relatively large for these AUTs and require time-consuming dual-axis positioning of AUT to map the radiation pattern.

Rohde & Schwarz and Greenerwave have reached a breakthrough in ESA antenna testing in a joint measurement trial, achieving highly accurate radiation pattern characterization in the near field, significantly reducing measurement time. Greenerwave’s innovative SATCOM user terminals are based on reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (RIS), allowing the company to design electronically steerable antennas that deliver high-performance connectivity while reducing energy consumption and reliance on semiconductors compared with conventional solutions.

For the joint measurement campaign, Rohde & Schwarz provided its R&S TS8991 over‑the‑air and antenna measurement system, equipped with a conical cut positioner, and its R&S ZNA vector network analyzer. Together, they evaluated Greenerwave’s passive single‑aperture ESA that uses RIS technology for beamforming. The antenna under test (AUT) features a 50 x 50 cm aperture and is designed for low power consumption and easy integration. 

The measurement covered an extended upper hemisphere down to a polar angle of 120 degrees, using a one-degree step size. Ten Ku band frequencies were recorded in a total of 32 minutes, thanks to the system’s hardware trigger function. Data was processed using the R&S AMS32 antenna measurement software, which applied a FIAFTA near-field-to-far-field transformation algorithm. 

Comparison with the original simulation based on a numerical twin model and with results from Greenerwave’s CATR setup showed peak gain or directivity variations of max. 1 dB and typically 0.3 dB, validating the accuracy of the near-field solution. Export options allow users to continue analysis in tools such as CST Microwave Studio or MATLAB.

The trial shows that even large SATCOM antennas can be characterized quickly and accurately with the R&S TS8991 antenna test system from Rohde & Schwarz in a near-field setup, providing a practical alternative to large-sized far-field chambers or CATRs. 

According to Rohde & Schwarz, the system setup can be used by other SATCOM makers testing broadband, IoT or back haul antennas for applications requiring flexible beam control and high data rates. The setup can be integrated more easily into research lab environments, and it shortens test cycles, reducing overall development cost.

<p>The post Rohde & Schwarz and Greenerwave achieve fast antenna characterization first appeared on GPS World.</p>