SPRINGFIELD, VA – By now, many of us have Global Positioning System (GPS) units in our cars, either built-in from the manufacturer or stand-alone devices that we’ve added. These are smart devices. They know where we are and, when we input a destination, they give us directions on how to get there. GPS technology has also found a place in boating, and for quite a while now, in aviation. As a pilot, I use this technology every time I fly.

GPS has introduced some remarkable improvements in aviation and, in fact, is one of the cornerstones of the Federal Aviation Administration’s next generation air traffic control system, code-named “NextGen.” NextGen, however, uses GPS improvements that you don’t get in your car. One is Wide Area Augmentation, which provides an additional degree of accuracy and reliability, both desirable when functioning in a critical environment such as U.S. airspace. The other is Traffic Information Service — Broadcast. This is akin to having your automobile GPS understand not only where it is, but also the ability to know the location of every other car on the road. These capabilities are combined into a service we call Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast, or ADS-B for short. With ADS-B, each aircraft broadcasts its GPS position, and receives the broadcasts of other aircraft similarly equipped. For aircraft not equipped with ADS-B, FAA radars will convert radar signals to ADS-B position data and broadcast that.

This technology enables some remarkable improvements in FAA’s air traffic control system. One is the ability to fly an approach to an airport using minimum altitudes that were not possible before. Thus, an aircraft’s chances of getting into airports with adverse weather are improved. Do you think that express mail companies are interested in that capability? You bet! Another advantage of ADS-B is that it allows FAA to develop airport approaches that are not a straight line, as approaches using traditional ground-based equipment are. This enables all kinds of turning approaches — to avoid terrain, for instance, or to enable simultaneous approach operations into airports with closely spaced parallel runways, such as San Francisco, when simultaneous straight-line approaches in bad weather are not possible.

Speaking of ground-based equipment, the GPS component of ADS-B enables approaches to be developed for any airport, without requiring expensive ground-based equipment. And since ADS-B is far more accurate than radar, it will enable FAA to decommission approximately half of this nation’s secondary surveillance radars, greatly reducing the cost of operating the air traffic control system. All these developments enable enhanced use of our airport infrastructure — increasing its use in bad weather, increasing capacity and efficiency, and improving safety.

The Federal Aviation Administration is working with U.S. airlines to get them to put ADS-B equipment in their aircraft and, in return, is enabling more straight-line routing, which results in shorter flying times and reduced fuel burn, saving millions of gallons of fuel per year. We are also developing and publishing more GPS-based airport approaches each year, and these now outnumber our published approaches based on ground-based navigation equipment.

ADS-B is already operational in Alaska, where the population depends on aviation to a far greater extent than in the continental U.S. It will soon be deployed in the Gulf of Mexico. FAA intends to deploy ADS-B over the continental U.S. in the next few years; it started in Miami, Florida last fall

FAA’s NextGen initiative is far more than just ADS-B — it will enable digital communication, digital weather modeling and other capabilities. It will support a level of air traffic that is magnitudes more than current levels — safely, efficiently and effectively. NextGen will be less costly to operate and generate significant fuel savings for air carriers and other users of U.S. airspace. NextGen is the path that FAA will take to fly into the future.

Copyright 2009 Army Times Publishing Co. All rights reserved. From http://www.federaltimes.com. By Dave Bowen.
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