BRAUNSCHWEIG, GERMANY (dpa) – The SAS airliner was already picking up speed on its flight to Copenhagen. Shortly before it lifted off from Milan’s Linate airport, it crashed into a German jet, killing 118 people.
There was thick fog on the ground, bad visibility for the pilots and air-traffic controllers and no ground radar.
That accident this October shocked the world.
To prevent that sort of accident, experts at the German Aerospace Research Establishment (DLR) in Braunschweig, northern Germany, have spent years developing a tower simulator to provide improved technical systems for flight safety on runways and taxiways.
“Aeroplanes are simply easier to follow in the air,” says DLR expert Christoph Meier. Once a jet has taken off, a computer- controlled radar screen shows controllers in the tower its exact position, altitude and identification at a glance.
For movements on the ground, however, the controller has to form a picture of the situation in his head. “For this, he relies on information radioed by the pilots and direct sight of the planes from the tower,” says Meier.
At present, only major airports in Germany such as Frankfurt are equipped with ground radar, although the pictures they provide at times of bad visibility are rudimentary. Airport buildings, cars, parked planes and the smaller spaces on the ground make it difficult for controllers to spot movement on the monitor.
The scientists in Braunschweig are developing a system which captures moving planes and vehicles on a constantly updated computerized plan of the airport. The system combines various data sources.
“We take radar impulses, information from positioning systems in the planes and images provided by cameras and sensor relays on the runways and create a clear animation,” says Meier. Tests using the new system are already running at Braunschweig, Hamburg and Prague airports and should be completed by the end of 2002.
There is still no date for completion of the system for distribution but Meier assumes that the new technology will quickly become standard because besides additional safety it also promises airport operators and airlines economic benefits.
“Once aircraft traffic is organized effectively, airport capacities will also increase,” says the expert.
Initially, the electronic airport image will make work easier for air-traffic controllers in the tower.
“In the next stage, the computer animation will be relayed to pilots via the cockpit monitor,” says Meier. This will tell the crew whether they are on the right track, or on course for a collision.
At the moment, pilots operate in a similar way to any car driver: a map shows taxiways, parking positions and runways. However, because of the tiny screens on the cockpit, they are hampered by poor all- round visibility.
