Delhi, Mumbai airports to receive air traffic control upgrades
23 Oct 2009
India's two busiest airports are testing upgraded air traffic control software designed to improve security and reduce delays. The new systems will become operational in 2010 once they have been tested fully.
The Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI) in New Delhi and the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport (CSIA) in Mumbai are looking to upgrade from existing Raytheon AutoTrac II systems to AutoTrac III generation software. The new systems are equipped with an arrival manager tool.
The upgraded Track III features a flow management system for generating arrival lists, a medium-term collision detection alert and automatic route non-conformance alerts for aircraft.
The existing Track II system only offers a short-term collision alert to generate warnings if two aircraft fly dangerously close to one another.
According to Raytheon, AutoTrac is a fully integrated open-architecture system that has evolved from over 30 years of ATC experience.
The system uses industry standard hardware and software. It uses commercial hardware and a non-proprietary operating system (UNIX). It offers reduced risk while assuring software portability and future expansion.
It uses a fully functional flight data processing system as well as a fully functional radar processing system.
The system integrates radar and flight plan data and displays the most accurate information to air traffic controllers in a logical, easy-to-read manner increasing controller productivity. It also reduces fatigue and stress and improves reliability.
