Etihad first trialed the use of FliteDeck Advisor as part of its 787 “Greenliner” program. (Boeing)
Etihad Airways is giving pilots of its Boeing 787 fleet a flight optimization tool, Jeppesen’s FliteDeck Advisor, that the Middle East carrier expects to help reduce fuel consumption on a per-flight basis.
FliteDeck Advisor is Jeppesen’s mobile application that is capable of providing pilots with real-time, tail-specific, in-flight advisories to improve flight profile, fuel burn and flight schedules. Etihad, the largest Middle Eastern 787 fleet operator, has been evaluating the use of FliteDeck Advisor ever since it first began collaborating with Boeing on initiatives to improve its fuel savings. The airline’s current fleet includes a total of 39 Boeing 787s.
According to Boeing, the selection comes following an trial period of FliteDeck Advisor on several of its 787s, where the airline found that the technology “delivered cruise fuel savings of 1.4%, saving an average of 350 kilograms of fuel and 1,100 kilograms of CO2 per flight,” the company said in an announcement of the selection by Etihad.
Jeppesen’s FliteDeck Advisor is an EFB application. (Jeppesen)
Sulaiman Yaqoobi, vice president of Flight Operations, Etihad Airways, said the airline has been “very pleased with the fuel and cost savings” they’ve already achieved using the application. “FliteDeck Advisor was tested as part of the Etihad Greenliner program, and it is great to now see it deployed across the 787 fleet, helping Etihad achieve efficiency gains and reduce CO2 emissions,” Yaqoobi said in a statement announcing Etihad’s selection of the FliteDeck Advisor.
Jeppesen describes FliteDeck Advisor as being capable of analyzing “tail-specific” flight performance recommendations that are “superior to those in the flight management computer and flight planning systems.” By analyzing route-specific data relative to the originally filed flight plan, the application considers a wide variety of variables to include fuel burn, time savings and airplane-specific performance metrics such as aircraft degradation.
Etihad 787 pilots also use Jeppesen Crew Rostering and Boeing Wind Updates for crew scheduling, charting and navigation.
“Etihad has been a tremendous partner in advancing sustainable aviation technologies,” Duane Wehking, vice president of Digital Aviation Solutions at Boeing Global Services said in a statement. “We are excited to continue providing them with solutions that help them decarbonize their fleet while meeting their commercial goals.