Navigation system to track flights implemented: AAI official

ADS-B, a satellite-based navigation system to track and guide flights over vast oceanic area, has been implemented to meet the challenge of a burgeoning air traffic in the region around the Indian coastline, a top AAI official said today.
"We have been consistently upgrading the systems and procedures. We have accomplished implementation of ADS-B (Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast) in Chennai, Mumbai and Kolkata flight information regions with overlapping coverage," Airports Authority of India's Air Navigation System chief V Somasundaram said here.
ADS-B is a cooperative surveillance technology in which an aircraft determines its position via satellite navigation and periodically broadcasts it, enabling it to be tracked. The technology was implemented months after the Malaysian flight MH-370 went missing on March 8 with 239 people on board.

Somasundaram was speaking at a seminar on Indian air traffic management, organised by Air Traffic Controllers Guild (India), which was inaugurated by Civil Aviation Minister Ashok Gajapathi Raju.
The AAI official said that the process of implementing 'Upper Airspace Harmonisation', which integrates various high -tech systems, sensors and radars, was being implemented in Chennai and Mumbai and the process for Delhi and Kolkata would be completed soon.
Once fully implemented, it would bring improvement in operational efficiency of air traffic management, enhance safety of aircraft operations, effect fuel savings and reduce the workload of pilots and air traffic controller.

With this system in place, "pilots can get take-off clearance and a host of other data, including live met data, inside the cockpit computer without any voice communication," Somasundaram said.

In his speech, Minister Raju stressed upon the importance of civil aviation and said this was seen in the recent devastation caused by the Kashmir floods and cyclone Hudhud where relief materials were transported through the "fastest mode" of aviation.
He asked air traffic controllers to make suggestions and put them into practice to make air travel safer and smoother.
Hai Eng Chiang, Director of Civil Air Navigation Service Organisation (Asia-Pacific), pointed out that 3.1 billion people travelled by air in over 36 million flights, with the Asian region growing the fastest, posing a major challenge to air navigation in this part of the world.