Something I did not know

A completely serendipitous find during a Google search: I had no idea that then-President Ronald Reagan decided to offer the fledgling Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) system for civilian use to airplanes and boats in order to prevent incidents like that of Korean Airlines flight 007, which was shot down after straying over Soviet airspace, with no survivors. 

From the New York Times:

On Sept. 1, 1983, a Korean Air Lines passenger jet on its way from New York to Seoul strayed north of Japan into Soviet airspace. On the assumption that the unidentified 747’s radar blip indicated some sort of spy plane, Soviet air command scrambled MiG and Sukhoi fighters. One of the Sukhois made visual contact with the jet, fired warning shots, and then knocked it out of the sky, killing all 269 passengers and crew.

The Reagan administration decided that the best move was not military retaliation, but to make the fledgling global positioning system, a joint program between the Air Force and Navy, available free of charge to airlines and shipping companies around the world as soon as it became fully operational. G.P.S. tells you where you are, period. With that kind of godlike navigating power, the thinking went, the 747 never would have lost its way.