Back to Air Transport IT Review - Issue 1, April 2009

AIRCOM news

Removing the clouds from European skies

The Single European Sky programme to transform European air traffic management (ATM) has lofty ambitions. The removal of borders between national airspace will bring the cost of ATM in Europe under control. It aims to enable efficiency gains of 6-12 percent, enabling savings of up to six million tonnes of CO2 and an annual fuel cost saving in the range of US$ 10 billion.

The European states established Eurocontrol in the 1960s to harmonize ATM, but it required consensus, making progress slow. It has taken the executive power of the EU to make real progress towards rationalizing the 50 European air-traffic control centres. This will save up to €1 billion per year from the €8.3 billion national ATM charges levied in 2007.

However, this depends on successful negotiation across governments, industry groups, forums of Functional Airspace Blocks (FABs) and ATC centre consolidation plans. EU states will not need to surrender sovereignty over national airspace. But they will need to agree to use Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSPs) that are not limited to national boundaries.

SES infrastructure modernization

The Single European Sky (SES) institutional process needs to be complemented by modernization and regional integration of the Air Traffic Management infrastructure. Today's system still uses analog technology defined in the 1940s. The European ATM modernization plans launched in the 1990s have introduced new technologies in each system element that now need to be integrated and become the standard.

The EU Commission calls this SES technical component SESAR. It has worked through Eurocontrol and an industry consortium to develop a SESAR ATM Master Plan. The second step of this process is the ongoing creation of an organization called a "Joint Undertaking" to deliver the target system defined in the Master Plan from 2014.

Building the foundation for SESAR implementation

The system the SESAR Joint Undertaking plans to deliver cannot, however, be built on today's legacy ATM system. The EU Commission has defined a SESAR implementation package 1 to build the foundation that needs to be in place by 2014. It includes many elements in which SITA is already involved. It will:

Implement airport CDM (plus extension to regional airports)
Implement initial airport data link (departure clearance and D-ATIS)
Deploy secure CPDLC to complement VHF voice communication
Reduce aircraft impact on the environment
Integrate airline information into ground trajectory prediction
SWIM-enable applications (CDM, flight plan/flight data, aeronautical weather)
Create a European IP backbone network, including Voice over IP
Move towards digital NOTAMs and digital Aeronautical Information Management
Integrate weather information in ATM and Airline AOC Systems

Data link services have been identified as a key tool for stretching European ATM capacity and efficiencies. They are expected to ease bottlenecks that currently exist on voice communication channels significantly. The EU Commission has mandated that all aircraft flying in Europe be equipped with data link systems by 2015.

SITA is playing a central role in this work. Our goal is to facilitate the creation of a single aviation market in Europe - with established common rules and standards for all aviation stakeholders - to ensure an efficient and sustainable European air transport system.

Philip Clinch
SITA VP Aircraft Communications & Messaging

Based on 'Green and Single - the European Sky' published in Aviation and the Environment
> See also SITA's AIRCOM Industry Report, volume 13, Q3 2008

SITA delivers Eurocontrol Data Link Gateway

The Eurocontrol ATC centre in Maastricht is the first in the world to implement ICAO's standard version of Controller Pilot Data Link Communications (CPDLC).

The centre has commissioned a new Flight Data Processing System (FDPS) that will make CPDLC fully operational in line with the EU Single Sky Regulation.

Eurocontrol in 2007 issued an RFP, won by SITA and partner Egisavia, to provide the Maastricht new FDPS with a gateway handling data connections to user aircraft. The German ANSP DFS joined the RFP for the gateway.

The SITA/Egisavia gateway (the "Data Link Front End Processor" or DL-FEP) handles aircraft connections using new ICAO standard ATN/VDL protocols and existing ACARS protocol to access aircraft with data link avionics.

The US approach

'NextGen' is the transformation programme for the US National Airspace System (NAS), including the national system of airports. It defines the new technologies to ensure future safety, capacity and environmental needs are met.

The US Federal Aviation Administration and its European counterparts are ensuring NextGen harmonization with SESAR. More information at: www.faa.gov/nextgen.

Mark your diary: AIRCOM User Group

The next SITA AIRCOM User Group meeting will take place 5-7 May at the Hotel Omni Mont-Royal in Montreal, Canada.

Sessions will be run for the AIRCOM Server User Group, the AIRCOM User Group and AIRCOM IP Workshop. Visits will also be organized to the Montreal-based AIRCOM Operations Centre. Further details can be obtained from Ana Rua.