NavList:
A Community Devoted to the Preservation and Practice of Celestial Navigation and Other Methods of Traditional Wayfinding
From: John D. Howard
Date: 2016 Aug 10, 14:46 -0700
Mark,
I echo your lament to CROSSCHECK. This is not a new nor GPS only. Look into the KoreanAir flight that crossed into Russia and was shot down. Seems the crew typed in the wrong digits into their INS.
A friend of mine flying a C-141 landed at the civilian airport at Ankarna instead of the Air Base Inserlick. The INS said straight ahead but everything else ( VOR, TACAN, Loran, ADF ) said left. This was back in the 1980s
Look at the ( Asian ) airliner that crashed at San Francisco a few years back. Good weather, the crew saw the airport but the autopilot, autothrotles, FMS ( flight management system ) all said pull power back and the plane hit the ground short of the runway. At least three pilots were in the cockpit and no one said " Hey, we are a little slow"
GPS is a great aid to navigation but fails more often to " Head up your a** "
John H.