On November 13-14th, representatives of the Polish Air Navigation Services Agency together with partners met in Gdansk for the SESAR Open Day. This is a cyclical event during which the entities involved in SESAR (the technological pillar of the Single European Sky initiative) research and development projects present the level of progress of ongoing works. During the meeting, the project PJ.02-06 was approved, aimed at increasing the level of safety on runways at secondary airports in low visibility conditions.
Surveillance systems are the domain of large airports. A-SMGCS or airport surface movement radar (SMR) require significant organizational and financial expenditure for their operations. This is the main reason why such systems are not available in the smaller airports environment.
At the same time, technological progress means that the possibility of using innovative air traffic control methods is increasing. The growing use of remote tower systems, as well as virtualization and digitization trends, allows for a different approach to system availability problems, aiming to reduce the cost of implementation – a key barrier to the availability of modern systems.
During SESAR2020 PJ.02-06 RTS 5 Open Day, PANSA and THALES Land & Air Systems together with partners presented the effects of work on Alternative Ground Surveillance (AGS). The prototype created for the purposes of confirming the feasibility of such a system (E-OCVM V2) consists of the standard A-SMGCS system and a modified remote tower system. Cameras replace the airport surface radar, while air traffic mapping takes place on the radar screen.
During the open day, representatives of research and innovation environments had the opportunity to learn about the prototype and its elements and take part in one of the exercises. The open day ended with a discussion on the conclusions from the current project phase.
Participants, also representing space users, welcomed the current level of prototype development and emphasized the importance of the system development for the aviation and the support of ATS services. In their opinion, the system already shows the appropriate potential for implementation.
As a system dedicated to small and medium airports, AGS also ensures low implementation costs and great flexibility, which is crucial for its future use. THALES LAS and PANSA, together with the partners: Edisoft and WASKO S.A., will continue to develop the prototype in Gdansk, where conditions for development work have been created together with the Airport Gdansk.
