Russia is responsible for GPS jamming that has disrupted thousands of European flights and caused a Finnish airline to halt travel to Estonia, the country’s Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said.
Finnair announced on Monday that it would suspend daily flights to Tartu after two of its planes were forced to return to Helsinki when their GPS signals were disrupted.
The European Aviation Safety Agency warned in January that authorities had observed a “sharp increase” in interference in recent months, especially in the Baltic States, but did not specify the source of the disturbances.
Then in March, an RAF plane carrying British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps had its signal jammed while flying near the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad while returning to the UK from Poland.
At the time, military chiefs warned that a secret Russian system known as Tobol, based in Kaliningrad, could be jamming signals from planes and ships, causing them to “malfunction.”
But Estonian officials now believe that the most important source of interference in the Baltics lies on the Russian mainland, near St. Petersburg.
“We have evidence that it comes from Russia, and Russia is violating all international agreements,” Tsahkna said.
“I’m really sure they know exactly what they’re doing,” he added.
Russia is believed to be responsible for GPS jamming that has disrupted thousands of European flights (satellite image shows alleged jamming station in Kaliningrad
This image purports to show one of the satellite dishes of Russia’s secret Tobol GPS jamming system in Kaliningrad.
In March, an RAF plane carrying British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps had its signal jammed while flying near the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.
Finnair has suspended flights to an Estonian airport over GPS interference concerns
Finnair announced on Monday that it would suspend daily flights to Tartu after two of its planes were forced to return to Helsinki when their GPS signals were disrupted.
“We have evidence that it comes from Russia, and Russia is violating all international agreements,” Estonia’s foreign minister said of GPS jamming in Europe (Vladimir Putin pictured).
Tsahkna told the bbc His nation had located three sites from which the GPS interference was coming: one near St. Petersburg, another in Kaliningrad, and another in Pskov, near the border with Estonia.
Although the minister did not offer details, open source researchers also agreed with his assessment, charting the flight paths of aircraft that had experienced jamming and working to find the intersection where the signal disruption was most intense.
This method was corroborated by other analysts who carried out dozens of drone flights and recorded the positions where they suffered interference.
Data collected from these investigations appear to show a GPS ‘black hole’ at a position southwest of St. Petersburg, where several Russian military bases are located, suggesting that one or several of these bases are likely the main source of jamming attacks. .
Jamming systems, such as the ‘Tobol’ platform believed to be used in Kaliningrad, typically work by generating and then transmitting a signal on the same frequency used by planes or ships.
This coincident frequency overwhelms the GPS receiver on board these vessels and confuses the navigation system.
Instances of this type of interference in Europe have increased dramatically since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Jamming GPS signals reduces the accuracy of several missiles and drones used by Ukraine, including Western-provided GMLRS rockets, which help Russian troops and military and civilian assets evade attacks from kyiv.
Dr Thomas Withington, of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) think tank, told the Telegraph earlier this year that Russia is likely using these jamming devices as a defensive tool.
But this has significantly interfered with civilian aircraft and maritime vessels.
Aircraft logs have revealed jamming hotspots in the Baltic region, the Black Sea and the eastern Mediterranean, with a map showing where attacks have allegedly occurred.
Jamming GPS signals reduces the accuracy of several missiles and drones used by Ukraine, including GMLRS rockets provided by the West.
Sun recently reported that some 46,000 flights reported satellite navigation problems in the Baltic region between August last year and March.
These included 2,309 Ryanair flights, 1,368 Wizz Air flights, 82 British Airways flights and four EasyJet flights.
Estonian military chief Martin Harem said the blockade does not exclusively apply to air traffic, as ships traveling through Finland, the Baltic countries and Poland have also been affected by the blockade.
“What we have seen is a malfunction of GPS for ships and air traffic,” General Harem, commander of the Estonian Defense Forces, told the Telegraph.
The extent to which civil transport has been disrupted by Russian interference in the Baltics has led some to question whether Moscow is deliberately targeting civil aviation in Europe.
‘We really don’t know if [Russia] they want to accomplish something or just practice and test their equipment,” Harem said.
RUSI war expert Dr Jack Watling told The Sun that Russia has “long used GPS jamming as a tool of harassment” and that the country is “projecting it beyond NATO borders” .
“Wherever there is a large Russian garrison you see GPS denial and there is one in Kaliningrad,” he said.
“They just have those things on because there are standing orders.”
Interference with GPS signals reduces the accuracy of several missiles and drones used by Ukraine
An RAF plane carrying Defense Secretary Grant Shapps had its signal jammed while flying near Kaliningrad in March.
Discontinuation of GPS for civil aircraft is not considered a major threat, as most aircraft and airports have alternative navigation methods and do not rely on this technology.
However, Finnair was forced to return its flights to Helsinki because Tartu airport exclusively uses GPS to land planes.
And the practice can still be extremely harmful.
Justin Bronk, an expert on airpower and air warfare at RUSI, said continued jamming attacks could force airlines to drastically change their flight plans.
“Given the busy airspace in which (civil aircraft) operate, the lack of reliable GPS will significantly increase the separation distances necessary for safety,” he said, a measure that would be “hugely disturbing.”
Other experts warned that widespread GPS interference from ships also increases the likelihood of collisions at sea.
Dana Goward, president of the US-based Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation, told the BBC: “When we remove GPS, clearly, to some extent, the efficiency and safety of the aviation system is going to decrease.”
‘People have to go back to old procedures that they are not as familiar with. “There will be some damage and we just hope it all stops before something bad happens.”
