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Aviation Applications
| Applications | |
|---|---|
| Title | Aviation Applications |
| Author(s) | GMV. |
| Level | Medium |
| Year of Publication | 2011 |
Overview of Aviation Applications
GNSS overcomes many of the deficiencies in today’s air traffic infrastructure thanks to its accurate, continuous, all-weather positioning.[1] During en-route flight, the availability of GNSS will ensure high robustness through the redundancy and high reliability of the service. [2]
In the future, higher accuracy and service integrity will allow aircraft separation to be reduced in congested airspace, to cope with traffic growth. GNSS will be used in en-route flight phase of commercial aircraft.
Detailed information about En Route Navigation can be found here.
Approach
Approach, landing and take-off are critical flight phases and the major need of commercial operators is to have full operations in all weather conditions. As a consequence, precision approach is a mandatory requirement.
The GNSS, with the aid of ground-based augmentation (local elements), will satisfy the needs for precision approach as defined in the aeronautical standards, and could replace or complement the navigation infrastructure of airports in regions where the system is inadequate. The most prominent example is the airports that not equipped with instrument landing systems.
Detailed information about Approach can be found here.
Attitude Determination
The Attitude Determination is one of the many applications where GNSS can be effectively employed.[3]
The attitude of an aircraft, i.e., the orientation in space, can be determined by measuring the relative positions of multiple GNSS receivers mounted on different positions of the aircraft. Usually, a set of 3 or more GNSS receivers placed on board of an aircraft can provide the complete information to compute the aircrft's attitude. [4]
Detailed information about Altitude Determination can be found here.
Air Traffic Control
Air traffic controllers need position, heading, speed and time information for the continuous management of all aircraft. Some areas of the world, lack the appropriate ground infrastructure, including secondary radar and communication links. Standardized transmission of GNSS navigation data will lead to advanced systems and techniques for safer air traffic monitoring.
The Automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) is currently the most important system used in ATC side, which relies on GNSS as primary data source, to obtain aircraft's horizontal positions.
Detailed information about Air Traffic Control can be found here.
Notes
References
- ^ GSA GNSS Market Report - Issue 1, October 2010.
- ^ Galileo Application Sheet - Aviation Applications, ESA and European Commission, October 2002
- ^ TUDelft - Attitude Determination and Formation Flying
- ^ Static and dynamic GNSS attitude function testing of airborne equipment, H. Kannemans, National Aerospace Laboratory NLR, April 2005