GPS Ground Control Sites
Global Positioning System :
Control Segment
By Sean McGowen

The CONTROL segment consists of monitor stations, ground antennas and the coordinating Master Control Station (or MCS). The monitor stations passively track all space vehicles (or SVs) in view, accumulating ranging data of which is incorporated into orbital models for each of the satellites. The models compute precise orbital data (ephemeris) and SV clock corrections for each satellite. The MCS sends the updated navigation information to the SVs via ground antennas. The SVs then send subsets of the orbital ephemeris data to GPS receivers over radio signals. Each monitor station coordinates have been precisely surveyed with respect to the World Geodetic System 1984, (or WGS-84), previously adopted in 1972.
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