NATS, the Air Navigation Service Provider (ANSP) for the United Kingdom’s major airports, has selected Saab subsidiary Saab Sensis’ Wide Area Multilateration system (WAM) for the location and identification of flights in the vicinity of Edinburgh Airport.
The system will replace the Monopulse Secondary Surveillance Radar (MSSR) for terminal area surveillance. Saab Sensis said its WAM system will provide NATS’ air traffic controllers at Edinburgh with approach control surveillance of commercial, general aviation and helicopters operating within 60 nautical miles of the airport.
Saab Sensis multilateration uses multiple non-rotating sensors to triangulate aircraft locations based on transponder signals to provide air traffic controllers with precise aircraft position and identification information regardless of weather conditions. Each multilateration sensor deployed by Saab Sensis supports Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (ADS-B), providing an infrastructure that is ready for today’s surveillance needs and tomorrow’s avionics.
“ANSPs such as NATS have recognized WAM as a cost-effective, long-term surveillance solution for traditional secondary radar applications,” said Ken Kaminski, vice president and general manager of Saab Sensis. “Saab Sensis WAM provides comprehensive surveillance of all transponder equipped aircraft today with the ability to seamlessly transition to ADS-B in the future.”