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| To brief the airline community on SESAR 1 achievements and SESAR 2020 opportunities, Airbus hosted a customer focus group in Toulouse, France, which was attended by representatives from European airlines and key personnel from the SESAR (Single European Sky ATM Research) Joint Undertaking. Photo: Airbus |
[Avionics Magazine 10-14-2016] Airbus has joined forces with key European stakeholders to find new solutions for building a more efficient Air Traffic Management (ATM) system. The company now has an active role in the Single European Sky ATM Research (SESAR) initiative, part of its commitment to shaping the future of air transportation and driving sustainable growth around the world.
“SESAR has five objectives that we’re working on in parallel: increase capacity at airport level, enhance flight efficiency, increase safety, lower costs, and reduce the environmental footprint of aviation,” explained Patrick Schuster, Airbus engineering director of multi-program projects and ATM.
In 2016, the SESAR joint undertaking is wrapping up its first wave of research projects, called the SESAR 1 phase, and is preparing to start SESAR 2020 activities. This next step will in particular deploy mature SESAR 1 concepts and solutions on a significant number of revenue flights, with the goal of starting very large-scale demonstrations in real airline conditions by 2019. Airbus already has made significant contributions to testing and demonstrations conducted so far during SESAR 1, including performing some 60 flights for the initial 4D (i4D) trajectory trials as part of its role in the Providing Effective Ground & Air data Sharing via Extended Projected Profile (PEGASE) consortium.
Airbus is also focusing on improving the workload share between pilots and air traffic controllers, such as for separation assurance, where a certain distance must be maintained between aircraft on approach. The company participated in testing and development for research into more advanced cockpit systems that would help the pilots keep a proper distance, while freeing controllers for other activities.