___
___________________
NEWS __
IRELAND The lri h Aviation Authority (IAA) has successfully completed its transition to a corporate body and in its first year of operations it recorded a turnover of 1£48.1million (US$76.96 million) and a retained profit of 1£1.6 million. Formerly the Air Navigation Services section of the Department of Transport, the IAA came into being on I January 1994.The lAA is responsible to the governmentfor the operation of ATC and the regulation of safety standards. However, the Authority raises its own finances and can borrow from banks. However, complete privatisation is not ctmently on the government agenda. Recent ATC improvements include the commissioning of surface movement radar at Dublin Airport and back-up radars in Shannon, Dublin and Cork. The Authority employs I 50 people at Dublin Airpo11 , 111at its headquarters at Cork Airport, 204 at Shannon Airpo11and 112at Ballygirren AeronauticalRadio Station. Ill BULGARIAHughes Aircraft Company has delivered an upgraded air traffic control system to the Varna Area Control Centre in Varna, Bulgruia. This is the 29th Hughes TracView system world-wide. The Varna system consists of seven operational positions supporting enroute, approach and tower operations. The system includes short tenn conflict alert, minimum safe altitude warning, synthetic radar video display and enhanced flight data processing. Additionally, 4 remote military co-ordination positions have also been installed in Vama and Burgas.
• HUNGARY The Hungruian Air Traffic and Airport Administration (LRI) has selected Siemens to provide the Air Traffic Management System at the new Budapest Air Traffic Control Centre. The contract, known as the Magyar Automated and Integrated Air Traffic Control System (MATIAS)is w011happroximatelyOM 30 million. The system will comprise radar dat a and flight plan processing plus voice communicationsand some 45 controllerworking positions. • CANADA Hughes Aircraft of Canada Limited has announced that the Treasury Board of Canada has approved an amended contract between Transport Canada and Hughes Canada for the development and installation of the Canadian Automated Air Traffic System (CAATS). The new contract is valued at US$ 360 million with a final deliverydate for the system of July 1998.. Both sides have admittedthat it was necess ary to amend the original contract in order to accommodatethe current needs of the system, including technological changes, enhanced risk management provisions and project managementcontrols. As part of the contract, Hughes has awarded a multi-million dollar contract to Barco Chromatics. of Belgium. to supply more than 500 IVS5600 graphics controllers for both the CAATS and the military system, MAATS. The graphics controllers will be integrated into the CommonControllerWorkstation(CCWS).
• CHANNELISLANDS The Siemens Watchkeeper/ap100 has been selected by the States of Guernsey for use as an Air Traffic Monitor in the tower at Guernsey Airport. Featuring a high brightnessscreen, the system will display primru-yradru·returns from the local Plessey AR I5 radru·as well.as SSR data, fed in from Jersey. The ATM will also be connected to the Flight Data Processing System to display QNH and Code/Callsign information. Ii SCOTLAND The UK Civil Aviation Authority has awarded Thomson-CSF a contract to supply a voice communication control system TXM 4400 for the Prestwick Air Traffic Control Centre. The TXM 4400 follows similru·contracts for London Stansted Airport and the Manchester Air Traffic Control Centre.
•HONGKONG The Hong Kong Civil Aviation Department (CAD) has awarded a contract to Kongsberg Norcontrol to provide a new Surface Movement Guidanceand Control System for the new airport at
THE CONTROLLER/DECEMBER 1995
_____
_ __
_ _______
__
_
Chek Lap Kok. The equipment consists of a J-Band radar to be delivered by Cardion Inc. of the USA. along with the Kongsberg Norcontrol NOVA 9004 radar display and processing system. The ASDE -3 radar , which includes a Rotodome and dual transmitters/receivers each which can operate with frequency agility, will be installedon top of the new control tower. Kongsberg Norcontrol will be providingthe radar data processing systems, including tracking and labelling and runway incursion monitoring for 4 operational positions.The tracking and labelling system will be interfaced to local approach radar and the airport infonnation databases. AU aircraft and vehicles on the runways and taxiways will be labelled and have incursion monitoring checks perfonned upon them.
• THE NETHERLANDS ATC Netherlands have signed a contract with Hughes (UK) Ltd. ATC Training and Simulation for the delivery. in the second half of I998, of a fully integrated,36009 Channel FIRST Tower Simulator. The system will be installed in the new central building of ATC Netherlands , curre ntly under con stru ction at Amsterdam Airport, Schipol-Eastarea. The order is valued at some 7 millionDutch Guilders(US$ 4.2 million). • FINLAND Siemens Air Traffic Management has achie ved a milestone in the Finnish Air Traffic Management Integration (FATMI) progrrunmewith the acceptance of the FATMI demonstrator. This will enable the Finni sh CAA to gain early fam iliarisation with the human/machine interface and provide a focus for initial controller training.The demonstratorcomp1isesan ATC workstation loaded with fully integrated pre-release software. The screen display will feature maps of Finnish airspace with aircraft tracks de1ivedfrom either live or recordedprimaryand secondaryradar inputs. The contract was awarded to Siemens in 1992. and phased deliveries and installation are to begin in 1996. The system will be based at the two main locations of the Approach Control Centre at Helsinki Airport and the Area Control Centre at Tampere.
• GERMANY The Karlsruhe Upper Airspace Control Centre has been supplied with a new voice communicationsystem (VCS) made by the Viennese company Frequentis. The system was developed with their consortium prulner Siemens and some 142 controller units with access to more than 70 external telephone lines and 90 radio channels had to be connected. • VIETNA!\IThe ..Blue Dragon·' ATC system. supplied by ThomsonCSF. was inaugurated on I5 November. 1995. With this programme. Vietnam became responsible again for the air traffic control of the Ho Chi Minh FIR. which has been conu·olled from Bangkok and Singapore since 1975. Thomson-CSF has installed at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City an en-route approach and control radru· station (TRAC 2000 associated to a RSM 970 radar). an approach control centre with a tower and !LS 381 landing aid equipment. Da Nang Airport has also been provided with a radru·station. fLS and a control centre togetherwith a RSM970. MSSR. installed at Quy Nhon. a city on the Mandruintourist route.
• USA The FAA plans to issue a Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) in January calling for the eliminationof most long-range. enroute primar y radar sites in the US. by the end of the centur y. Additionally. the NPRM will recommend lowering the minimum altitude for the operation of transponder equipped ai;craft to 6.000ft amsl. but exempt airspace 2.500ft above the surface in mountainous areas. To help compensate for the loss of primary radars. the FAA would rely not only on improved secondary radars but satellite based data link systems and automatic dependent surveillance procedures. If the NPRM is issued in January. it is expected that it will take at least five or six years to deactivate the 73 radar sites under consideration.
25