Regarding the May 27 story “Who will bring home the beacon? Feds offering up lighthouse” (Page A1):
The Little Mark Island Monument off Harpswell in 2001. The federal government is giving away the 50-foot structure, which is topped with a deactivated white beacon light; its interior, a space called a mariner’s refuge, was originally stocked with supplies for shipwreck survivors who might wash ashore there. Gordon Chibroski/Staff Photographer, File
A sentence in reporter Tim Cebula’s article – “Lighthouses are no longer critical navigation tools for ships since the advent of GPS” – is totally wrong, scary and riddled with ignorance.
Indeed, lighthouses, navigation beacons and buoys are vital to safe marine navigation because GPS is subject to interference by solar flares, hacking, operator error and satellite maintenance needs, and can be shut down by the government with the flip of a switch. These vulnerabilities and more are so well known that every navigation chart has a large warning for users to “not rely on only one source of information to determine position.”
The source of that statement should have been identified because, in my opinion, it is not accurate.
Jack Boak
docent, Pemaquid Point Lighthouse
Bremen
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