DANS signs first cooperation agreement with EUROCONTROL in the GCC

The Cooperation Agreement has been signed by the CEO of DANS His Excellency Mohammed Abdulla Ahli and the Director General of EUROCONTROL Mr Frank Brenner today during a seminar on “RECAT-EU” hosted by DANS. The event was attended by various national stakeholders from the aviation industry, and witnessed participation from International organizations such as EUROCONTROL, and DSNA, the French Air Navigation Service Provider.

DANS is the first ANSP in the GCC to sign a cooperation agreement with EUROCONTROL. The agreement will provide new opportunities for mutual benefit and will also pave the way for collaboration on research and development, exchange of information and provision of support on specific activities between both organizations across various fronts. The deployment of this agreement will also provide DANS with a significant edge through access to unique market intelligence, as well as the opportunity to collaborate on cutting edge concepts.
One of the first areas for joint activity that will take place under this agreement, is to advance the research on the Wake Vortex concepts. Wake has a large role to play in determining how many aircraft can land at an airport in a given time period.

DANS has been experimenting how the wake spacing between successive arrivals – the gap between successive aircraft – can be safely reduced.  One of the wake projects is called RECAT, which is designed to recategorise the existing four wake turbulence categories into six new wake categories. DANS has been running a campaign to capture wake data for the last 18 months, and now has the database of approximately 160,000 tracks showing wake vortexes behaviour in the Dubai environment.    
EUROCONTROL has been instrumental in the RECAT concept research and has developed a Safety Case which has subsequently been endorsed by the European Aviation Safety Agency.
The agreement will enable further research on RECAT and the sharing with DANS of the safety case developed by EUROCONTROL.The agreement will also assist in delivering solutions such as RECAT, which is one of the potential solutions to be utilized by DANS to accommodate the escalating increase in capacity at Dubai International Airport,  the world’s top airport for international passengers.

Frank Brenner, Director General of EUROCONTROL, stated: “This ground-breaking agreement between EUROCONTROL and Dubai Air Navigation Services will allow us to jointly make an important contribution to the activities that are underway in ICAO to define improved international wake-based separation minima bringing safety and economic benefits to aircraft manufacturers, airlines and airports such as Dubai.We are very pleased to begin working with our colleagues in Dubai Air Navigation Services, and this cooperation agreement is supported by the 41 EUROCONTROL member states”.
He added:” We believe it is an excellent example of how the different regions of the world can cooperate to drive forward a common project of benefit to all.”  

His Excellency Mohammed Abdulla Ahli stated : “As a result of the compelling vision set out by HRH Sheikh Mohamed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum for Dubai, the aviation sector has been experiencing exponential growth and development across various fronts. And inorder to continue moving towards further success,Dubai Air Navigation Services (DANS) has identified in its operational strategy the importance of increasing and maximizing the scope of cooperation with International organizations. The deployment of the cooperation agreement between DANS and EUROCONTROL marks an important milestone in the history of aviation , that will mutually benefit both organizations”.
He also added: “As a step in the right direction, we will be collaborating on the wake vortex project which is of tremendous importance to Dubai considering the massive air traffic increases it is witnessing at both airports. DANS invited all the national stakeholders in the aviation sector‎‏ to discuss the opportunities of benefiting from this project in the future, regarding the increase of capacity in all the UAE airports”.  

EUROCONTROL is committed to building, together with its partners, a Single EuropeanSky that will deliver the Air Traffic Management (ATM) performance required for the 21st century and beyond.

Dubai leads the region in terms of air traffic movement. Dubai is set to see 665,000 yearly aircraft movements by the year 2020. The growth rate of aircraft movement clearly suggests that Dubai International and Al Maktoum International in Dubai World Central (DWC) are on a curve of exponential growth.

• DANS to get exclusive access to market intelligence and information from EUROCONTROL
• Agreement to mutually benefit DANS and EUROCONTROL
• DANS studying wake vortex behaviour in Dubai environment
• Dubai to see 665,000 aircraft movements by 2020