AUTOMATIC NAVIGATION FOR SUPERSONIC TRANSPORTS

Present-day, production-line automatic inertial navigation equipment, originally developed for the guidance of strategic missiles and space vehicles, offers today's air transport industry (1) a self-contained navigational system capable of rendering aircraft completely independent of all ground-based installations except the terminal airports and (2) a means of supplying continuously and automatically the exceedingly precise positional reports needed for a truly comprehensive air traffic control program.

The implications of inertial navigation to air transportation and air traffic control are the principal subjects of this paper.