Airport news / 24 January 2012 /
Today marks the 10th anniversary of the Reduced Vertical Separation Minimum (RVSM) programme, one of the most important air traffic management projects Europe has ever seen. On 24 January 2002, at 01:00 UTC, 6,000 air traffic controllers in 41 States allocated aircraft to 6 new flight levels: from one minute to the next, aircraft were safely separated by 1,000 feet instead of 2,000.
Airport news / 10 January 2012 /
2011 is forecast to see 3.3% (± 0.1%) growth in flights across Europe, a downwards revision from the last publication. Current economic trends as well as traffic disruptions in Egypt and Libya have led to decelerated flight growth, including declines in some States.
Latest issue / 8 December 2011 /
To set the context for this article I would like to state something that is evident to all, that causes huge problems for everyone, and which, for a long time there was no effective remedy. Flights are delayed (for perfectly legitimate reasons) and cannot be ready to depart at their scheduled times, but this information is not relayed to many of the people who should know.
It is likely that you are already aware of Airport CDM and have an idea of what it is about. For those of you who don’t know what it is, let me put it simply; A-CDM makes the turnaround process of a flight at an airport as efficient and as predictable as possible. The core of A-CDM is information sharing between airport partners. Surely information is shared at every airport every day you may ask? No, it is not. I am certain that many of you will have experienced the effect of not sharing information. Here are a few examples: your flight pushed back from the gate before scheduled departure time, there was no long delay waiting at the runway for take off, and, at the destination airport you did not go around in a holding pattern. You land 15 minutes early and arrive close to the parking position. Great! Then comes the dreaded announcement from the flight deck; there is another aircraft parked in the stand and it is not ready to leave. In fact, the other aircraft cannot depart the stand for at least another 20 minutes. By the time you finally disembark, your ‘15 minutes early’ arrival time has been swallowed up and you are late. Or, you land on time, arrive at the stand but this time there is no one to operate the air-bridge, or, you arrive on time at a remote stand but there is no bus to get you to the terminal. Conversely, you look out the window and see empty aircraft stands surrounded by perplexed looking ground services staff. I could go on, but I’m sure you get the idea and have your own experiences. (more…)
Airport news / 7 December 2011 /
The Director General of EUROCONTROL, David McMillan, today announced the appointment of Lieutenant-General Jac Jansen of the Netherlands Air Force as the new Director of the Maastricht Upper Area Control Centre (MUAC). Lt. Gen Jansen will take up his functions as of 1 April 2012.
Airport news / 29 November 2011 /
The threat of climate change, the global economic crisis and the resulting changes in the structure of the European aviation market have led to a renewed focus on efficiency and performance for Europe’s airports.
Airport news / 9 November 2011 /
At a ceremony which took place on 8 November, EUROCONTROL celebrated 10 years of the ARTAS service and 20 years since the launch of the ARTAS concept.
Issue 5 2011 / 5 October 2011 /
The future Air Traffic Management (ATM) system will rely on advanced data exchange and data sharing services that communicate aeronautical information (infrastructure, route network, aerodrome, terrain, obstacle data) into the operational activities on the ground and in the air.
The Aeronautical Information Exchange Model (AIXM) is a specification that enables the encoding and the distribution in digital format of the aeronautical information. Although the term ‘aeronautical information’ might sound relatively generic, it clearly links AIXM to the ICAO Annex 15 – Aeronautical Information Services, which defines the information that ICAO contracting states have to provide internationally. This is also the primary scope of AIXM, which aims to support the transition from what is frequently referred to as ‘the current paper-based AIS system’ towards a more efficient and more capable Aeronautical Information Management (AIM) system, based on digital data exchange. (more…)
Issue 5 2011 / 5 October 2011 /
Today there are a number of diverse technologies available to aid operational staff in their work to prevent runway incursions and excursions and assure runway safety. The kinds of technologies we refer to include systems for air traffic controllers, pilots and manoeuvring area vehicle drivers and provide an alert that a runway is in use or situational guidance to those operating on the manoeuvring area.
Runway alerting systems for pilots and vehicle drivers can be extremely effective but one significant drawback is that for many runway incursions the prime causal factor is a breakdown in communication between the controller and the vehicle driver or pilot – in short they believe they have received a valid clearance to enter a runway. Likewise for controllers, their surveillance based alerting systems have, and will continue to, save many serious incidents – however the alerting time on occasions can be very brief – almost too brief for any effective action to be taken. Consider the situation where a pilot, for whatever reason, crosses a runway holding point and starts moving towards the runway, he will get to the edge of the runway in seconds. In that time the system will need to detect the situation – alert the controller. The controller needs to work out from the display where the incident is and what the best course or recovery action is – and remember he may well be very busy. The situation and avoiding action needs to be conveyed to a pilot who needs to understand what is being said and react accordingly – clearly this could be very difficult in just a few seconds. (more…)
Airport news / 3 October 2011 /
EUROCONTROL, European air navigation service providers, ICAO, Eurocae, the FAA and industry have completed a number of actions which mean that implementation of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) in ATM can now begin.
Airport news / 20 September 2011 /
For the year to date, London Oxford Airport increased the number of average daily business aviation departures by 12.2%, year-on-year up to September 2011 according to the latest statistics released by Eurocontrol.
Airport news / 18 August 2011 /
In a significant competitive win, ARINC Incorporated has been awarded the contract to provide Eurocontrol with a test system to validate the functioning of VDL Mode 2 (VDL2) avionics in a multi-frequency environment.
Airport news / 4 August 2011 /
The summer closure of the Treviso airport and the steps taken by EUROCONTROL upon request of its partners to mitigate the impact of this closure are a practical example of the many benefits of integrating airport operations and flow management more closely into the European ATM network.
Airport news / 20 July 2011 /
For the first time ever in the EASA Annual Safety Review, a specific chapter on ATM has been included, containing safety data derived from EUROCONTROL’s reporting mechanism, the Annual Summary Template (AST).
Airport news / 18 July 2011 /
EUROCONTROL has just received a formal letter from the European Commission, nominating the Agency to take on the role of European ‘Network Manager’ as defined in the Single European Sky II (SES) legislation.
Airport news / 8 July 2011 /
EUROCONTROL has issued its 9th ATM Cost-effectiveness Benchmarking Report (ACE).
With contributions from Wayne Smith, Head of Information Services at Birmingham Airport, Christian Poulsen, Vice President, Assets and Technology at Copenhagen Airport and Christopher Stein at the Siemens Infrastructure and Cities Sector.
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