A soldier from 2nd Squadron, 2nd Cavalry Regiment touches a newly installed component of the Mounted Assured Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) System (MAPS) Generation 1, (MAPS GEN I), a powerful suite of new hardware and software that will ensure Les soldiers have assured position and timing to navigate in a degraded and denied GPS environment. The members of the Project Manager Positioning Navigation and Timing (PM PNT) landed in Germany at the beginning of September with a mission: to equip soldiers’ Stryker vehicles with the latest positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) equipment in cooperation with the US Army Europe and the 2nd Cavalry Regiment, Assured Positioning, Navigation and Timing Cross-Functional Team (APNT CFT), TRADOC Capability Manager – Tactical Radios (TCM-TR), and Rose Barracks Fleet Mechanics. The team’s goal for September was to equip a large number of Stryker vehicles with the latest enhancements to augment and secure the primary function of GPS equipment.
SEE THE ORIGINAL
ROSE BARRACKS, VILSECK, Germany – Dan Sweet, a trainer with Project Manager Positioning Navigation and Timing (PM PNT) instructs a soldier from 2nd Squadron, 2nd Cavalry Regiment on the general use of the Mounted Assured PNT System (Positioning, Navigation and timing) (MAPS) Generation 1, (MAPS GEN I), a powerful suite of new hardware and software that will ensure soldiers have assured position and timing to navigate in a degraded and denied GPS environment. As adversaries across the spectrum with new capabilities to disrupt and degrade GPS, soldiers will need more fortifications and assurances in these systems. The MAPS Directed Requirement was approved in January of this year, which was the first step in ensuring soldiers receive the most modern NTP equipment as it becomes available. U.S. Army Photo/John Higgins
SEE THE ORIGINAL
ABERDEEN PROVING GROUND, Md. — Uncertainty in military operations is never good. This can impede movement, make planning ineffective, and affect morale.
The positioning, navigation and synchronization project manager makes it his duty to eliminate the uncertainty of navigation. Product Manager Mounted Positioning Navigation and Timing focuses on this mission with mechanized units and their vehicles.
The end of 2021 marked a milestone for their efforts, as the 1,000th vehicle was equipped with the Mounted Assured Positioning Synchronization and Navigation System or MAPS, Generation I. MAPS core functions include providing GPS capabilities in environments to reach a level of overcoming with an opposing force. – to bring that certainty to the classic army expression “shoot, move, communicate”.
MAPS offers two key features. The first is the anti-jamming antenna, and the second uses AC signals which can overcome signal degradation due to weather and terrain.
The Product Manager to bring the team to this point was Lt. Col. Andrew Johnston who took over the mission which began in September 2019. Johnston’s operational branch was Field Artillery, he worked at Picatinny Arsenal, then it was part of a “work with industry”. program among other programs before coming to Aberdeen Proving Ground, making it ideal for leading a TCP-focused team.
ROSE BARRACKS, VILSECK, Germany — Members of the Project Manager Positioning Navigation and Timing (PM PNT) landed in Germany in early September with a mission: to equip soldiers’ Stryker vehicles with the latest Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT) equipment. ) in cooperation with US Army Europe, and 2nd Cavalry Regiment, the Assured Positioning Navigation and Timing Cross Functional Team (APNT CFT), TRADOC Capability Manager – Tactical Radios (TCM-TR) and Rose Barracks fleet mechanics. The team’s goal for September was to equip a large number of Stryker vehicles with the latest enhancements to augment and secure the primary function of GPS equipment. A key component of the Mounted Assured PNT (Positioning, Navigation and Timing) (MAPS) Generation 1, (MAPS GEN I) system, a powerful suite of new hardware and software that will provide soldiers with assured position and timing to navigate a GPS degraded and denied environment is the system is the DAGR Enhanced Distributed Device or ED3, which can host up to seven GPS clients. U.S. Army Photo/John Higgins
SEE THE ORIGINAL
ROSE BARRACKS, VILSECK, Germany – Dan Sweet, a trainer with Project Manager Positioning Navigation and Timing (PM PNT) instructs a class of soldiers from 2nd Squadron, 2nd Cavalry Regiment on the general use of mounted assured PNT (positioning, navigation and Timing) System (MAPS) Generation 1, (MAPS GEN I), a powerful suite of new hardware and software that will ensure soldiers have assured position and timing to navigate in a degraded and denied GPS environment. As adversaries across the spectrum with new capabilities to disrupt and degrade GPS, soldiers will need more fortifications and assurances in these systems. The MAPS Directed Requirement was approved in January of this year, which was the first step in ensuring soldiers receive the most modern NTP equipment as it becomes available. U.S. Army Photo/John Higgins
SEE THE ORIGINAL
“The indirect fires community is a big user of PNT, so I knew all about that,” Johnston said. “The importance of this ability and what it does for the fighter has not escaped me.”
“I thought I was pretty good at NFP before I got here and I learned a lot more,” Johnston said. “The seeds of where we are going were planted a long time ago, we are just lucky to harvest this.”
To date, the PM Mounted PNT team has trained more than 1,600 soldiers during the equipping course. “It’s not easy to deploy a capability across an ocean,” Johnston said. “It’s even more difficult during COVID. Everyone had to be ready and deal with the restrictions.”
“It really depends on the people, and the Mounted PNT team is really lucky to have a lot of passionate people because they’ve done a great job of leadership,” Johnston said. “And the product team under PNT Modernization was indispensable.”
Learn more about MAPS
Comments are closed.